


Five times Batman could have saved the Joker and one time the Joker saved him

by 1000lux



Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan)
Genre: ...but bruce doesn't remember, 5 Times, 5+1 Things, Burnout - Freeform, Canon Divergence, Cracky, Explosions, F/M, Happy Ending, Humor, M/M, Movie 3: Dark Knight Rises (2012), Romance, a little bit of smut, a lot of other random DCU characters that I don't know too much about, backstory joker, fuck timelines or canon backstories, how the joker got his scars, jack napier - Freeform, no prior knowledge beside the nolan movies needed, not dark at all, the joker and batman know each other, the joker's there for the third movie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-12 12:43:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12959454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1000lux/pseuds/1000lux
Summary: Bruce reaches up and pulls the Joker down to him. The kiss is lasting, Bruce not letting go, still both hands savely on either side of the Joker's face that is devoid of make-up, as usual these days. As if the Joker doesn't need it in this apocalypse. As if there's no more point to be made. As if there's no more need for masks, in this kingdom of grime, where every bad guy is just the same.





	Five times Batman could have saved the Joker and one time the Joker saved him

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own rights to the movies or it's characters.
> 
> My first Batman/Joker story. Finally after writing on it for over a year it's finished.

******  
1: Cause we were both young, when I first saw you  
******

I remember how we felt sitting by the water  
And every time I look at you, it's like the first time  
I fell in love with a careless man's careful daughter  
She is the best thing that's ever been mine

(Taylor Swift - Mine)

***

He's eight and he's sitting at the police department. An officer wraps a blanket around his shoulders. Soon the detectives will be back asking him everything all over again. Bruce wonders who will pick him up when he's done here. There is no one left. No one. His parents are dead. The black claw of fear closes around his heart, squeazing hard.  
Across the floor, a boy his age is sitting. Dirty, blond hair. Bruises on his naked arms and face. Bruce wonders why he's only wearing a T-shirt in this weather. It's almost December. There's blood on the T-shirt. The boy looks over to him now. He smiles at Bruce for a moment, showing teeth. Then he rests his chin on his drawn-up knee and starts humming. Jingle Bells.

Detective Gordon is back. And Bruce remembers again that his parents are dead.

When the detectives finally take him home later, he walks past the desk where the other boy sat earlier. There's a small smiley drawn on the desk. It looks like dried blood. It probably is.

As they are in the squad car driving to Wayne Manor, Bruce draws a sad smiley face into the condensation on the car window. Jingle Bells is stuck in his head.

******  
2: We're a perfect match, perfect somehow, we were meant for one another  
******

Deliver me, out of my sadness  
Deliver me, from all of the madness

All of my life, I've been in hiding  
Wishing there was someone just like you   
Now that you're here, now that I've found you   
I know that you're the one to pull me through

(Sarah Brightman - Deliver me)

***

He's sixteen and he's at a prom. Some girl he met the other day invited him. He already lost her somewhere in the room. She was a bore anyway. A boy his age asks him to dance. He's so taken by surprise that he says yes. Unlike Bruce, the other boy actually knows how to dance.

"So, graduation, huh?" Bruce asks awkwardly.

The boy shakes his head, a grin splitting his face.

"Okay... Relative of you?"

"Just party crashing, like you."

"So, you already finished school?"

"No, another two years." The boy answers. "A boarding school of sorts, if you want." He shrugs, laughing.

"Yeah, me too."

They talk the rest of the evening. 

Bruce goes to get them something new to drink. Then he gets a call from Alfred. He has to leave immediately. He never makes it back to the ball.

In the paper the next day, there's an article about a fire at the local children and youths psychiatry.

*********  
3: Won't let you get away, if we ever meet again  
*********

You got the cure  
Underneath your shirt…  
Don't you wanna save this  
Dirty little damsel?

Your lips smudging all my  
Make up… kicking both my heels off  
Come and pin me down

We're hell raising  
And we don't need saving  
'Cause theres no salvation for a bad girl  
We're rock bottom  
But there ain't no stopping  
'Cause they don't know nothing about love

I'm your dream girl  
This is real love  
But you know what they say about me…  
That girl is a problem

(Natalia Kills - Problem)

***

He's twenty. It's a seedy bar. Loud beats vibrating through the air. Bodies dressed in leather and lacquer, pressing against each other. Bruce comes here for the drugs. From time to time. 

His hair is blond and straightened, only the ends are dyed black. There are scars on his face. Glasgow smile, he's read about that somewhere before. He's beautiful nevertheless. And Bruce is too drunk and drugged to ask, it's none of his business anyway.

"What's your name?" Bruce asks.

"Jack." The other smiles.

"I'm Bruce."

"I know."

They dance all night to the hypnotic music around them. In the early morning they fuck outside the club. 

Bruce never knows how he got home. He doesn't remember a thing in the morning. 

He gets up, swaying, waiting for the nausea to pass and gets ready to meet the supervisory council and convince them that he'll be able to lead the company once he turns 21.

Bruce doesn't read the paper, it's really too depressing. If he would, he'd read that there was a bank-robbery the night before. By a cross-dresser, dressed up in a Cheshire Cat costume and make-up. There's also a photo from the security cam included. If it wasn't black-and-white, you'd see the culprit wearing a turquoise wig with cat ears attached and a matching frilly dress. The painted-on toothy smile goes from one ear to the other. He's looking straight into the camera.

*****  
4: And paint my skin to your heart-beating  
*****

Imma give it to you hard  
So bad, so bad  
Make you never wanna leave  
I won't, I won't

(Selena Gomez - Good for you)

***

He's 25. It's Christmas and he's giving a ridiculous pompous party. Sparkling lights and evergreens everywhere. Models, congressmen and plain other millionaires are mingling beside each other. Bruce is bored to death. A small fortune in Champagne can't change that. He had the brilliant idea to make it a costume party, thinking it would be fun and also ironic, but it turns out boring people are still boring even in costumes. Bruce didn't dress up as Batman, because that would have been a little too much.

Then there he is. Standing upstairs smiling down at the dance hall. Blond curls, almost down to the shoulders. Angel wings. And golden glitter facial makeup, that makes him look like a statue come alive. Bruce tries to get to him all evening, losing him in the crowd again and again. 

In the early hours of the morning he's suddenly standing beside Bruce outside on the patio. 

"What are you having?" Bruce asks, indicating the other's drink.

"Absinth, soda, mango syrup."

Bruce makes a face. "You like it?"

"Nah, tastes like shit. My own creation. Wanna try?" The man offers.

Bruce does. It indeed tastes horrible. They kiss, both of them tasting like absinth and mango.

His laugh is beautiful and his hair exactly as soft as it looks. 

"What's your name?"

"A rose by any other name..." The angel insinuates.

"Well, I guess you know who I am." Oh, that sounded arrogant.

"No," The other smiles broadly. "Who in the hell are you?"

"So, do you wanna go somewhere else?"

"And leave this lavish celebration hailing mammon and buying us precious moments of obliviousness from our own mortality?"

Bruce laughs, "That's one way of putting it. Not a big fan of Christmas, are you?" He quirks an eyebrow.

"Oh, I'm a huge fan of Christmas. Just not that pretentious bullshit you're having here."

"Ouch."

"Oh, don't worry." He waves his hand. "It's good enough, I guess."

"I don't like it too much myself."

"Then, what do you like?" He raises an eyebrow.

"I like you."

"Now we're talking."

"I want to fuck you." Bruce whispers into his ear, feeling hot and giddy, like nothing else matters.

"Wouldn't be the first time." the other remarks offhandedly, eying him curiously.

Bruce freezes. "What?" He scrutinizes the other more closely. But for the hell of it, he can't place him. Too many years in too many different places with too much alcohol. And, really, he would remember this guy. "Are you fucking with me?" he asks with a smirk.

"And there I thought, you were the one wanting to fuck with me?" his elusive companion comments casually, trailing a finger over Bruce's collarbone.

"You're a joker, aren't you?" Bruce smirks.

"So they tell me." the glittering man replies with satisfaction.

Bruce leans forward and kisses him again, tasting the glittery particles even on his lips, not just the bitter taste of alcohol. He keeps his eyes open this time, latching onto those of the man in front of him. The lights reflect in the tiny golden particles, creating a bedazzling caleidoscope of colors, that's so bright it almost hurts his eyes.

"Who are you?" Bruce asks again, once the kiss's broken, with a breathless laugh. "Who are you?"

"8, 16, 20. Ring a bell?"

"Is that a riddle?" Bruce asks. "What's that supposed to be, your social security number?" he tries to joke.

The angel looks miffed now and not particularly impressed by Bruce's sparkling wit. He shakes it off soon enough.

"You wanted to leave earlier. Want to come over to my lair?"

"You got a lair?" Bruce asks, amused.

"I most certainly do."

"Okay. Should I tell someone where I'm going, in case I never come back?"

"Probably," the man concedes. "There's just a tiny problem." He leans in close, words wisping across Bruce's skin. "You don't know where you're going."

"I'm okay with that."

The stranger moves in even closer, their bodies lined together. Both his hands on either side of Bruce's face, he brushes his lips, softly, suggestively across Bruce's. "You're willing to go with a potential madman, just for the chance of a good lay?"

"»Are« you crazy?" Bruce asks.

"No, I'm not." He shakes his head with a soft laugh. "I'm not."

"What are we waiting for, then?" Bruce takes his hand, pulling.

"It's all just a joke to you, isn't it?" There's a short moment of resistence, then the other man follows. 

Bruce takes him towards the exit, back into the house, through the main area where countless, dressed-up bodies are mingling amongst Christmas-decor.

Once they're on the dance floor, where some couples are swaying to the sounds of the big-band, he stops, pulling Bruce to a stop too. "Before we go, let's dance," the angel challenges.  
Bruce's strange companion doesn't wait for an answer, pulling him into the middle of the dance floor. They move to a song that's probably just in the other man's head, definitely not what the band is playing. He's all over Bruce, writhing languidly against him, his hands claiming his body, seizing it like it's rightfully his. Sparkling and beautiful. Bruce couldn't tell how the other guests are reacting to him dancing with a man, he can't take his eyes off him. His back is pressed against Bruce, he rolls his hips, as he throws his head back against Bruce's shoulder, his hair spilling over it like a golden cascade.

"Now we can leave." He tells him, a little breathless.

"I'd do you right here on the dance-floor." Bruce whispers into his ear.

A man passes them on the way out. It's Commissioner Gordon.

"Commissioner." Bruce stops. "How are you doing? How's crime doing this Christmas?"

"Everything quiet tonight. Silent night, indeed, if only we'd catch the guy who blew up the Golden Leaf Hotel on Phelps Street. There was a psychiatrists' retreat there at the time, nearly booked out. Who does that? Destroying lifes of innocent people."

"Well, maybe someone who really doesn't like psychiatrists." the angel proposes with a shrug.

Gordon looks at him bewildered. "Who's your friend, Bruce?"

"Oh, that's–" Bruce realises he doesn't know his name.

"I'm a longtime aquaintance." the man in question fills in, throwing an arm around Bruce's shoulder. "We've known each other almost all our lives."

When it's clear, he's not going to add a name, Gordon offers a hand to Bruce. "Well, it was good seeing you."

"You too, James." Bruce shakes his hand. "Let's hope someone takes that sick bastard off the streets soon." And by someone they both know they mean Batman.

They finally make it out of the main hall. The fresh night air wafts against them. The angel turns around, his arms laced behind his head, a smile on his face.

"You know what, we're just too different."

"What?" Bruce looks at him dumbfounded.

"I want you so bad it makes me tremble. It's been so long. But I was angry. I always wondered what made you leave. Again and again. This time I'm going to leave. If you're smart, if you're as good as you think you are, you're going to find me. And maybe, once you do, you won't want me anyway." He turns and starts walking away. He hums Jingle Bells.

Bruce comes after him. "Wait! What's that supposed to mean?"

The angel only taps his head. "Cheerio, sweetheart." 

A loud crash sounds from behind Bruce. He turns around. When he looks back the angel isn't there anylonger.

He's gone as suddenly as he came. Leaving behind only a shoe. 

 

There's a incident involving rivalling gangs that night. Bruce really has to wonder who does that on Christmas. Anyways, he leaves the party, gets into his bat-suit and drives to the location. It's already over when he gets there. The storage compound is in flames from several explosions. Dead mobsters are littering the floor. The cops are barricaded behind several squad cars.  
All in all it sums up to 5 pounds of uncut heroin missing. Twenty dead mobsters. Five dead cops. 

Bruce gets back home and instead of getting intel on the newest resident criminal, he looks through all the guest-lists, for the angel who'd crashed his party, but never finds him. He keeps the shoe. Purple. Patent-leather. Who wears that?

******  
5: I can be the subject of your dreams, your sickening desire  
******

But you can learn,   
You can fight with a will to survive,   
Or you can follow on the path of your lifeblood  
Your peers, and your leaders

Tearing down the preachers  
Had enough of Jesus  
Disappear into the ether  
Breaking out from the animal keepers

Throwing your hands in the air  
Acting like we really care  
Taking them all for a fool  
You fool everyone but not me

(George Barnett - Animal Keeper)

***

He is 30. He accompanies the prison transport that takes the Joker to Arkham, now that his trial is over.

"You shouldn't keep lying to yourself, you know." The Joker smiles at him, slightly dazed due to the sedatives they gave him to keep him quiet during transport. Not that the Joker wouldn't still be able and willing to kill, without being chained up head to toe. "We're one of a kind. Knew it the second I saw you."

"You don't even know who I am."

"Ah, I always knew who you are. Even when you didn't know yourself. Now, that sounded incredibly cliched, but I hope you'll excuse it and appreciate the sentiment behind it."

 

The Joker keeps smiling at him, biting his lip, as his feet are chained to the floor. Smiles at him across the metal table. Like he isn't wearing a straight-jacket. Like in front of him isn't sitting Batman. He's smiling in what would be called coy in the real world. Like he's standing on his doorstep, waiting to see whether his date is going to kiss him.

"When are you going to visit?"

Batman snorts. "Don't flatter yourself. I had all the closure I needed, during the trial."

The Joker starts singing. "Don't look at me that way, like you know how it's going to end."

"Oh, come on!" Batman gets up. "I really don't need this shit."

"Cause I'm too tired to be honest, and I'm too hurt to pretend," The Joker continues unperturbed, turning up the volume.

"I'm not going to visit." He says with finality, moving towards the door.

"At least we'll always have Christmas!" The Joker calls after him as he leaves. He doesn't even want to know what he means with that. Crazy fucker.

As he walks down the hallway, he still hears him singing. "Walk out on me, walk out on me! I'll see you for the last time. Walk out on me, walk out on me! Giving you a life line. Say so long and then walk away."

 

"What do we have?" Bruce asks Gordon, holding onto his coffee cup like a life line. "Don't tell me, we have his fucking fingerprints and everything and we still don't know who he is."

"Jack Napier. He killed his father when he was eight. Was in psychiatry until they had to release him at eighteen. Sad story actually, I remember it now. The father had killed the mother. But, the psychiatric evaluation said the boy'd be a danger to himself and others, so they kept him locked up. Says in his file, he escaped on several occassions. At twenty-two he spent two years at the Gotham State Penitentiary, for armed robbery," He cocks an eyebrow. "where he shared a cell with one Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot." Gordon and Bruce throw each other a meaningful look. "That was the only time he was arrested."

"Not Arkham?" Bruce asks surprised.

"No. He seemed pretty sane back then. Or so it says here." Gordon replies. He looks back into the file. "From then on nothing."

"How did he get out after only two years for something like armed robbery?"

Gordon snorts, shaking his head. "Good behaviour." He leafs to the next page, taking out a loose envelope. "At 25 he was admitted to the Kensington State Asylum for the Criminally Insane. That was in California, so we never heard about it until we had his DNA in the system. There he was treated by one Dr. Harleen Quinzel, who we all know by now. She was also the one who broke him out after half a year. The weird thing is that he seems to have turned himself in there, after robbing a bank. They never found the money, though."

"How did he get those scars?"

"Beats me. Didn't have the scars when he left children and youth psychiatry. Already had them when he went to the state pen. The four years between, nothing."

 

He only watches him from the outside. In his cell, made of security glass –that reminds him too much of 'The silence of the lambs'– half lying on a chair, legs hanging over the chair-back, head hanging off the chair, hair touching the ground, shuffling cards, without paying mind to the occassional batch falling onto the floor. Serenely he keeps on shuffling the cards until all but one are lying strewn across the floor. He smiles at the card contently, before throwing that one too, on the floor.

"You wanna see a magic trick?" He asks the stuffed piglet that's lying on his bed.

He pulls piece after piece of colorful cloth tied to each other out of his sleeve.

Bruce just stands there and thinks that he expected anything but this. Five shoeboxes full of prison records, trial transcripts and therapy protocols can't sum up what makes the Joker up.

*****  
+1: When our eyes meet, I can only see the end, but tonight I'm here, yours again  
*****

What I would do to take away  
This fear of being loved, allegiance to the pain  
I would give anything to change this fickle-minded heart  
That loves fake shiny things  
Now I fucked up and I'm missing you  
Never be like you

Stop looking at me with those eyes  
Like I could disappear and you wouldn't care why

I am only human can't you see  
I made a mistake

I'm falling on my knees  
Forgive me, I'm a fucking fool  
I am begging darling please  
Absolve me of my sins, won't you?  
I am only human can't you see

Cause I got it  
Never be like you

(Flume - Never be like you)

***

He's 32. Gotham is in ruins. Bruce tried to protect his city and failed. Bane and his men have taken over.

His company was taken over. His weapons taken by Bane's men. And he sits in his manor like the pathetic failure he is. Waiting for the world to end.

*

While the football-field caves in, the Joker is sitting amongst the spectators, eating popcorn, while humming the National Athem.  
As people have run for their lives and the seats around him are abandoned, he realises a girl of maybe five years is still sitting beside him, holding on to a bag of popcorn nearly as big as her.

"Now, what are you doing here?" The Joker asks curiously.

"You can get trampled to death if people are running like this," the girl tells him gravely.

"That is correct," the Joker asserts approvingly. "Would you like a sip?" He asks her, offering his jumbo-sized cup of coke.

"No. You shouldn't take things from strangers," the girl informs him.

"You, Miss, are a very careful girl." The Joker nods appreciatively, taking a slurp himself.

"My daddy says, these days the streets are full of criminal scumbags. But I'm not allowed to say 'scumbag'."

"I don't mind," the Joker assures her. "Well, sweety, if we want to live, we should go now." He gets up and tosses his popcorn away. Moments before the floor caves in under their row, the Joker has scooped up the girl and made his way to the exit. The girl is still clutching her popcorn.

*

The Joker is standing in the room suddenly. Emptying his pockets that seem to be full of pill bottles. "Lorazepam. Valproate. Imipramine. Quetiapine." He pauses, looking at the last bottle sceptically. "Do you think I need Neuroleptica?" He reads the label, making a face. "Schizophrenia, huh? But it's sure good shit if you wanna sleep." He pockets the bottle again. "Well, well, well. I'm sure you're wondering by now, what is the Joker doing in my house? Am I maybe in the Joker's house? Have I lost my mind and only believe to be Bruce Wayne?"

"No," Bruce stresses. "Neither of those thoughts crossed my mind." What crosses his mind though, is that the Joker doesn't look much like himself today. Except for the make-up of course. Gone is the 20s street-gangster look and his hair doesn't look like it hasn't been washed in the last two weeks either. The trenchcoat is of a lighter color and doesn't have these ridiculous wide shoulders. Sticking out under the trenchcoat he can see jeans and trainers. Which makes him idly wonder what kind of shoes the Joker was wearing usually. Probably a sign of post-traumatic stress, but well.

The Joker makes a face again. "Well, because you're unimaginative. They should prescribe pills for that," he mutters to himself. "You might want to excuse my disposition, I'm just currently getting off my meds. All of them, that is. Not what the doctor prescribed," he sing-songs.

Bruce doesn't ask why the Joker isn't in Arkham. Arkham was overrun weeks ago. He should probably only be surprised that the Joker took this long to pay him a visit.

The man in question looks around the room, strewn with empty food containers and bottles, back to Bruce's sunken shape on the couch in semi-darkness. He checks the light-switch. Still darkness. "You know," he starts. "I can always pick the Imipramine off the floor again, if you need it."

"What do you want, Joker?" Bruce asks, tiredly.

"Check up on you?" The Joker shrugs. "And now that I've seen under what reprehensible circumstances you're vegetating here, I have to wonder what your butler is getting paid for." He shakes his head, regretfully. "You can crash at my place," he then offers generously.

"Why would I do that?" Bruce asks, apprehensively.

"I have Netflix."

Bruce snorts. "I own Netflix."

"I still have working electricity in my house." The Joker wiggles his eyebrows.

"Let me rephrase that," Bruce starts again, voice slow and gravelly. "Why would you do that?"

"Let's say, I'm a man of a few simple tastes."

"Like dynamite, gasoline and gunpowder?" Bruce laughs weakly.

The Joker nods serenely. "Yes, and maybe one or two other things." His serious demeanor falls off him seconds later. "Come on, sleepover! It's gonna be fun!"

"Okay." There's no legit reason for it. There's no reason against it either. He has no value anylonger. No purpose. He might as well see where this goes. And one thing, he's become pretty sure of, by now. The Joker doesn't want to kill him. Take the rest of his sanity? Maybe. Kill him? No.

 

They take a car that the Joker obviously hot-wired. They've been sitting in the car for ten solid minutes, when it occurs to him, that he's been talking to the Joker as Bruce Wayne, not Batman. That the Joker has zero to nil motivation to come and visit Bruce Wayne and that they've been talking to each other, with a familiarity that only Batman and the Joker have. 

His head jerks around to the driver of the car, who immediately turns his painted smirk from the road to Bruce.

"What is it, Batsy? Need to throw up, or forgot your cuddly blanket?"

"How long did you know?"

"All the time."

"You're bluffing."

"Am not. I have proof." The Joker smirks.

"What?"

"Not telling."

"Sure." Bruce snorts.

The Joker just keeps driving, giggling to himself.

*

It's a run-down house in a run-down part of the city. They take a geriatric-looking elevator to the tenth storey, while Bruce has visions of them both crashing to their deaths in that thing.

The Joker unlocks the door. "Please take your shoes off. Oh, and just so you're warned, we won't be alone."

"What you got in there? Underworld poker round? Abducted governors? Strippers?"

The door opens and a little girl with an outraged expression comes running towards them. "Mr. Joker, the microwave is broken!" she exclaims, like it's his personal fault, which, to Bruce's knowledge, it just might be.

"Composure, my dear, composure." the Joker pacifies.

"Oh my God," Bruce states. "You abducted a child."

The Joker throws him a long-suffering look of supreme exasperation. "Does she look to you like she's been abducted?"

"What then? She's your daughter?"

"No." the Joker replies long-drawn. "Our paths have crossed by mere coincidence." He shrugs.

The girl looks at Bruce with suspicion. "I know you from the TV," she tells Bruce, sounding not like that would speak in his favor.

"That's right." Bruce replies, helplessly.

She turns to the Joker. "Does he stay?" she asks, clear reservation in her voice.

"Yes, dear. You will barely notice him."

"I'll go brush my teeth, then." She throws a last glance at Bruce, through narrowed eyes, like she assumes she has to watch him around the Joker, before she walks off regally, presumably towards the bathroom.

The Joker scrunches his nose momentarily. "She'll take to you. Eventually."

"She lives here?"

"Why so surprised? So do you now."

Bruce can't fault that and he has to concede the girl didn't look like she's here against her will. Who knows which of the Joker's insane, criminal flings is actually a single mother. Maybe Harley.

"I'll show you your room," the Joker talks on, leading him through the flat that seems to become larger and larger the further they go in. "Don't touch anything. Don't fire the bazooka inside the flat. In the guest-bathroom are fresh towels and a toothbrush."

Bruce is this short of guffawing. Because, this is just ridiculous. In fact it is so ridiculous that Bruce wonders if he's maybe still inside his manor on a trip of LSD.

Bruce stands in the guest-bathroom, stupefied, a fresh, fluffy towel in his hand. "This is..." He pauses for a resolute minute. "very out of character."

"Oh, you'd be surprised how often I get the chance to entertain guests here."

*

They sit in silence at the kitchen table, in this flat that looks far too normal and far too posh, for a guy like the Joker. With a kitchen that's too much dirty dishes and breakfast cereals, too much granite tabletops and espresso machines and too little gunpowder and gasoline.

The Joker stands in front of the opened refrigerator, peering inside. "You want a beer?"

And now that he can't even see the Joker's make-up, this is all too fucking domestic. And he's been off kilter ever since he got here. And he just feels like doing something to call bullshit on the Joker's display of infinite serenity. Maybe then he'd be able to regain some of his own equilibrium.

"Jack Napier." 

Bruce sneers at the jerk that goes through the Joker. 

"Didn't think I'd know that?" he continues. "I know who you are. I know all about you, Joker. Don't fool yourself to think otherwise." He says, derisively.

"You're such a stupid bastard." the Joker says. "I can't believe this." He shakes his head, grabs a beer bottle and leaves Bruce behind in the kitchen.

*

Bruce makes his way through the flat, looking at everything that crosses his path. There is not much, except the earlier mentioned bazooka, which is lying on top of the shoe cabinet, beside a dildo, a Rubik's Cube and a groceries shopping list. Bruce doesn't touch either. At least it's out of the kid's reach, he pacifies himself.

He finds out, that one of the rooms adjoining the living room, is actually a walk-in closet. Bruce gets the feeling that the not inconsiderable amount of women's clothing isn't due to the Joker's girlfriend living here with him. The stilletos in size 12 seem to prove his point.

Eventually, he finds the Joker's bedroom. He's not sure, if he wants to apologize (he is a guest here, after all) or is merely curious, as he pushes the doorhandle.

The Joker is lying on a double-bed with dark red sheets, feet against the wall, eating a cup of joghurt, while tapping the rhytmn of 'Hold me, thrill me, kiss me, kill me' with his feet against the wall, while it is blaring from the speakers. He salutes Bruce with his spoon, when he enters. The Joker's only wearing boxers, his clothes strewn on the floor. There's no longer any makeup on his face.

"What's up with that?" Bruce asks, indicating his face.

"Oh, I'll stay in tonight. Finish some books. Update my Facebook correspondence. Hell, I haven't been online for three months. My friends must think I've forgotten them."

With everyone else that would sound just so plausible. Instead of treating it as the bullshit it obviously is, Bruce replies. "You've been in Arkham for two years." Like the lack of computer access is the most illogical part about the Joker's statement.

"More or less." The Joker scrunches up his nose apologetically.

"I think I would have known if you'd broken out in between."

"Sure you would."

The Joker goes back to just what he said. The next words out of his mouth are an exclaimed, "309 funny cat pictures! Are you kidding me?!"

Bruce doesn't feel any more compelled to leave than the Joker feels to make polite conversation. So, he takes his time invading the Joker's privacy. The room is normal enough. Just a regular bedroom. The bed actually being the only piece of funiture in it. Except an electrical Zen-well and a small Zen garden with a rake and a buddha statue in it.

There's a collage on the wall opposite the bed, consisting of photos and several random items.

A picture of the Joker and Harley in what looks like Harry Potter cosplay, grinning like literally mad.   
A few shots of explosions in different parts of Gotham, on glossy photo paper.   
A burning pile of money, that looks like it was taken with a shitty cellphone camera.  
The Joker in what looks like the rain forest.   
The Joker smilling into the camera on top of a pyramid, behind him the desert.   
A drawing of a smiling, cartoonized bat.   
A lineup of a few dead guys Bruce doesn't know.   
Harley and the Joker eating fried bugs in what could be Thailand.   
A selfie of the Joker wearing a nurse's outfit.   
Half of a leg cast with numerous signings and doodles.   
A plan of the Rome metro, several visiting sites circled in sparkly pen and notes full of exclamation marks and little hearts.  
The Joker swimming with dolphins.   
The Joker in full makeup, playing the didgeridoo with an Aborigine.   
A single striped sock.   
Harley and the Joker getting married in Vegas. Harley dressed as Frankenstein. The Joker as Frankenstein's bride.   
Harley and the Joker getting divorced in Vegas in equally embarrassing costumes.   
The Joker gingerly feeding a cut-up corpse to an alligator in the Everglades. Bruce recognizes the gang-tattoo on the arm, a gangsterboss who's officially missing to this day.

On the other side of the room, the wall is empty except for a photo-strip. The photo-strip is pinned to the wall, beside the headboard. It shows two laughing guys. Bruce realises one of the guy is him, maybe in his twenties. Much more disturbingly, the guy beside him is the Joker. His hair is different, but it's him. Bruce certainly doesn't remember taking that photo, doesn't remember any occasion where this photo could have been taken. He feels the urge to rip it off the wall. That has to be a fake. But it isn't. Why would the Joker bother to hang a faked picture where Bruce might not even see it? No, it has to be real. He feels a tug inside his mind, like he should remember, like somehow inside he knows where it's from.  
He pushes one knee onto the bed, grabbing the Joker's shoulder, pulling him up. The joghurt spills over the sheets. "Get up!" Bruce orders. "Come on!" 

The Joker half stumbles into Bruce, their sock-covered feet treading upon each other. He leans against Bruce for a moment, before pushing himself off him, not at all perturbed by the interruption of his evening snack.

"Where?!" Bruce points an accusatory finger at the photos. "Where from? Where?! Where the hell do we know each other from?"

"That's for me to know and for you to find out." The Joker smiles. "Shouldn't be so hard. You know everything about me, after all."

The Joker watches Bruce seethe for a few moments more, before he puts away his yoghurt cup and stretches with a yawn.

"Feel free to stay, but I'll go to sleep now. Busy day tomorrow." He puts a pink sleeping mask on, that reads 'Wake me before the hundred years are over and I'll kill you', and let's himself fall back onto the mattress. He claps two times and the light in the room goes off.

At this point something inside Bruce breaks and he decides to call it quits for today and just go to bed too. Hopefully by tomorrow reality will have found it's way back into it's normal path. And the Joker won't be living in a penthouse, having an appreciation for the finer things in life, while being an old aquaintance of Bruce.

*

Maybe he doesn't want to know, Bruce concedes. He can vaguely determine the time the photo must have been taken. Something twentyish. He wasn't in a good place back then. Before he met Rhaz al Ghul, before he became Batman, when he had absolutely not direction in life. Maybe he doesn't want to know what he did back then, how he knew the Joker.

And whyever the Joker kept that picture... Probably some sick joke. Or he's a horder. Bruce doesn't think about how that photo hung there all alone. Maybe the Joker found it later and thought it was a fun coincidence.

*

Bruce wakes up and neither is he chained to the bed nor thrown into a dungeon. As a matter of fact he feels rather relaxed considering the circumstances. From the state of lighting outside it's the next morning.

He stretches and looks down at the pyjamas the Joker lent him. The shirt is reading 'Sleepy but still Gorgeous' in glitter. The pants are labeled 'Property of Gotham State Penitentiary'. Outside the window, a dove is taking a shit on the window sill.

When he makes his way to the kitchen he already hears voices.

"No, Mr. Joker, pancakes are unhealthy. You should eat some oatmeal with milk and also fruit, for vitamins."

"Well, Ms. Melinda, since I'm the grown-up I shall have to insist on you eating pancakes or at least waffles."

"Morning." Bruce interrupts awkwardly.

The Joker is wearing a T-shirt featuring a cat with bat wings, reading 'Battitude'. 

The Joker turns to him, matter-of-factly. "Do you feel up to the task of risking body and mind, going for groceries?"

"Yeah. Sure." It's the least he can do really.

"It's a date." The Joker smiles toothily.

*

He didn't tell Alfred, he realises. He didn't even bring his phone. So he awkwardly has to ask the Joker to make a call on his landline. That way Alfred can at least trace the call and knows where he is.

He doesn't tell Alfred with whom he is. Just that he needed to get away.

*

It feels too fucking strange to even question it. He just rolls with it, having forgotten why he actually came here, but not coming up with a reason why not, either. And in this case, he's quite literally rolling. Or more precisely wheeling, the Joker's shopping cart.

There are actually super-markets in this district that haven't been overrun by panicked people, or robbed by gangs, or just basically blown-up.

"I thought we'd just steal them." The Joker shrugs, making a face.

"No, We're going to pay for them." Bruce answers, pushing their overflowing cart towards the exit.

"Be my guest. Oh, right, you already are." The Joker walks up to the cashier. "Bonsoir. My filthy rich house guest, here, will cover the bill."

"Are you sure we need twenty bottles of spiritus?" Bruce asks.

"Oh right, and a lighter."

*

The Joker is frying eggs the next morning, singing 'Wake me up, before you go, go' at a volume that could probably wake the dead.

"I hope you don't prefer them scrambled," he says when Bruce walks into the kitchen, throwing a towel across his shoulder.

"You're a weird guy, Joker. I can never really put my finger on it."

The lock of the front door clicks. Bruce jerks up.

"Oh, that's just Agatha," the Joker tells him. "The cleaning lady. She comes on Tuesdays."

So it's Tuesday. That's what Bruce takes from that.

*

"So, what do you do, when you're not blowing up buildings?" Bruce asks in the evening, after the Joker tucked in Melinda.

The microwave gives a ping and Bruce dutiful goes to shut it off. It's popcorn.

"Oh, I sit on the couch and watch my favorite TV-shows." the Joker replies.

"And what would that be?"

"Ah, well, Law & Order, Supernatural, The Mentalist, Gossip Girl, Justified, Suits, Once upon a time, The Royals."

"That's quite a lot."

"I've got a busy schedule. And a recorder."

"Didn't you say you have Netflix?"

"I lied."

"Why the hell don't you have Netflix?"

"Oh, come on, that takes the fun out of watching. No looking forward to the next episode. No commercials. Ugh."

"Yeah, I can totally see it now. Tons of fun I've been missing out on."

"What could be more fun than looking at all the things you don't want and don't need?" 

Half through a double episode of Gossip Girl, that taught Bruce that there's seemingly nothing worse than the loss of social standing, the Joker picks up the phone, ordering a set of elaborately fancy vegetable craters, that was just featured in a commercial.

"Didn't you say, you don't want all that?" Bruce asks, mildly amused.

"Most of it." The Joker shrugs. "I wonder how sharp those blades really are."

*

Why did he even come here? What is he still doing in this house? How can he live with this guy? Joke with him? As if it meant nothing. As if Rachel meant nothing.

Maybe it's really that curiousity got the better of him. That it's just too tempting to unravel the mystery right in front of him.   
The doctors never could.

*

"Let's go gather intelligence on our enemy!" The Joker jumps up from the kitchen table, bouncy as if he's had too much coffee, when for all Bruce could tell, he drank nothing but hot chocolate.

 

Bruce takes this opportunity to reconnect with the Commissioner who he'd last seen after the subway collapsed on top of the entire police force.

"Bruce! You're alive! I thought–"

"Sorry, Commissioner. I had to lay low for a while."

"Well, it's good to have you back anyway. I hope you have a plan, because as it is, I'm out of ideas."

"Well, if this isn't a fortunate coincidence." A voice booms around the corner. Bane drives in, sitting inside a humvee. Several of his goons jump off, surrounding Bruce and Gordon. All of them carrying automatic weapons.

"Don't worry, I won't kill you. I'll just make sure you'll have exceptionally good seats, watching the fall of Gotham." Bane tells them cheerfully in his cement-gurgling voice.

The men approaching them don't get very far though. A sniper takes out all of them. One after another.

Bane cuts his losses, puts his car in reverse and drives off, leaving the remainder of his men for dead.

"What the hell, Bruce– How?" Gordon's eyes travel, searching the surrounding buildings for the shooter.

"Well, well. Good evening, Commissioner." The Joker comes sauntering towards them through the corpses, dragging a sniper riffle lazily behind himself.

"He's on our side." Bruce says wearily. He's not even going to comment on the fact that the Joker quite obviously intentionally missed Bane.

"Honest to God," the Joker says, scratching his head with the muzzle of his rifle. "I wanna know what's under that mask."

 

The commissioner is a lot sooner onboard with that, than Bruce would have expected. Which probably doesn't speak for the state of the city, since Bruce actually last set foot out the house. Not counting grocery shopping with the Joker. 

"Do we have a plan?" Gordon asks.

"Share resources would seem like the next logic step," the Joker comments, hands in the pockets of his jeans that are far too tight. "Everyone calls in whatever they've got."

"I know someone I could call..." Bruce ponders. "I'm not sure, she'll come, though."

"Yeah, me too." Gordon starts dialing.

The Joker starts dialing too, talking to several people, seemingly without need for salutations or names. Some conversations laced with pleasantries, some with threats, most with both.

"Hi, darling... What do you mean in jail?... California? What, extradition?... Aww, third strike, that sucks!... Yes, of course I'll visit... My pecan nut crumble? Sure, I'll bring it."

"What? I never said it was fool proof. I said, it would prove you a fool... It's so like you to get hung up on details. Kinda like I left you hanging, back then. You know how I enjoy puns... Those were the days... Yeah, I know, these days, anyone thinks they can be a criminal. They got a rich daddy, who buys them a gang. We had to work our asses off."

"Yes, this is the Joker... Yes, the one with the great pecan crumble... Honey, I'll pass Waldo the recipe for you... What, he's dead?... Oh, right, I killed him. Well, I'll email you the recipe then."

"Alright, Pingu, now listen up!... What you did for me?! What you did for me?! You mean, corrupting a sweet, innocent, unstable teenager?... Same difference... You either be here till 6pm, or our friendship is officially over!" He hangs up. "Overdramatic my ass."

"Is your mom there?... Oh, they're watching the executions. Well, sweety, you know the rule. Don't set the house on fire. Unless you do it from the outside."

"Not as much as I want to kill you... Doesn't matter... Kill all your loved ones... Yeah, Aunt Matty too... Good... Good... Very good... Toodles."

"No, they're awful... Trust me. If there's something I know it's jewelry. You were really good at robbing banks. Go back to that."

"Ivy, Ivy, stop! Try to keep actions and time in order." The Joker holds the phone away from his ear. "No... Yes... Yes... Of course I called her first. This ain't my first rodeo, girl... Yes, by all means," He sighs. "bring her too. The more the merrier."

 

They make a temporary camp in the deserted police headquarter.

"Commissioner, I came as fast as I could." A young man comes running towards them.

"Gentlemen, this is Detective John Blake. Besides me, he's all that's left of the Gotham Police Force."

"Batman!" John looks at Bruce, delightedly. Then his eyes fall onto the Joker. His hand goes to his gun.

"No, no, no, boy." The Joker wiggles his index finger. "We wouldn't want the Commissioner to be all that remains of the Gotham Police Force, now, would we?"

"What is he doing here? Is he a prisoner?"

"No," Bruce answers. "We are in an alliance with him." The admission is followed by a long and hollow sigh.

 

"Well, if it isn't Selina Gomez!" the Joker greets Catwoman as she walks in.

"I hate you." she greets him.

"Aww, right back at you. Kiss, kiss?"

"How about I punch your face."

"You know each other?" Bruce asks, as the one person he could actually contribute to this, zeros in on the Joker.

"The criminal community of Gotham is a tight-knit, cozy, little family, didn't you know that?" the Joker asks amicably. "She's the slutty daughter and I'm the misunderstood, genius son. You could be the cousin no one invites to the parties, but who shows up anyway."

 

"Jooooker!" A girl with spiky red hair and a questionable clothing style comes storming in.

"Ah, look, it's your daughter." Selina sneers.

"What?!" Bruce jerks up.

"I swear, I don't even know that woman!" the Joker groans. Then he throws a fake-smile at the woman. "Hey, Duela! How's it hanging?"

 

"Harley! Darling, you look divine."

"Don't I always, butternut?"

"Yes, you do." The Joker gleams over his whole face.

Bruce is a little taken aback when the two start french kissing for a greeting.

"So, is this about the guy destroying the city?" Harley asks.

"Right, right."

"I already did a profile on him. Just in case."

"That's my girl."

 

"Now, that we've got all of us inglorious bastards here, let's get this thing started!"

Cheering all around them. The Joker pulls a bottle of Champagne from somewhere and pops it, while Harley throws confetti.

 

"Do we have anything even remotely representing a plan?" The Commissioner asks.

"Plans are for people who aren't imaginative enough to do things on the fly." The Joker shrugs.

Gordon turns to Bruce. "That bad feeling I've been having. It just turned worse."

"We destroy his infrastructure, his ways of communication, the spirit of his men." The Joker suddenly lists, very matter-of-factly. "I thought that was obvious."

 

By the end of the day, to everybody's surprise, the Joker has managed to garner most of Gotham's underworld. Even the Penguin made it just this side of 6pm.

*

Having followed the Joker blindly trusting straight into enemy territory (enemies included), –and Bruce has really started to wonder whether they've just run into a trap– Gordon asks the question that everyone's been asking themselves by now.

"So, was there ever a plan?"

"Of course, what do you take me for?"

The look Gordon gives says that he really really shouldn't ask that, in a loud and booming voice.

"Care to share?" Bruce finally prompts.

The Joker turns to look at Gordon and Detective Blake, like a stage magician presenting the culmination of the show.

"You are about to witness the strength of street-knowledge."

Explosions go off, ripping open the street right under the tank Bane's men brought with them.

Bruce's gaze goes between the Joker and the smoking military vehicle.

"Wait, did you just quote NWA?"

"You sure do know your song references." 

The Joker looks back at the destruction they've left behind, before he turns to Bruce with a smirk.

"As I leave, believe I'm stompin, but when I come back, boy, I'm comin straight out of Arkham."

*

An UPS-guy rings at the door while Bruce is alone with Melinda, the Joker being off with his lot, to do God knows what, all for the cause. Bruce for one thing is surprised that there are any deliveries being made still, for another that they're going to the Joker's place.

The apathetic delivery guy doesn't seem to care about his inner turmoil and hands him a pen. But then, he obviously doesn't care about the city being overrun by lunatic criminals either.

"You need to sign here."

Bruce agonizes for a few seconds, then signs. Jack Napier.

"Thank you, Mr. Napier." The guy doesn't even look at him.

Curiosity gets the better of him. And he tells himself that he's only acting in the interest of the public. There could be a bomb in there after all.

It's T-shirts, as it turns out. At least now he knows where he gets all those rather unique pieces.

 

The Joker dumps a grenade launcher on the floor, shrugging off his boots.

"Did you open my package?" The Joker asks, nose scrunched quizzically.

"Err," Seemingly he still has some qualms left about violating another persons privacy. "Yeah?" For a surreal second, he wonders if the Joker's going to throw him out now.

"And there I thought the nice folks from UPS were starting to slack with packaging. I hope you're properly ashamed of yourself?"

"I... think I am."

"So?"

"So what?"

"How do you like them?"

"Fine, I guess?"

"Come on, I should think you're able to make yourself an opinion."

"I liked the green one."

"Great!" The Joker hands him the green T-shirt cheerfully.

Bruce awkwardly takes it, both pushing it away and holding on to it at the same time.

"One was for you anyway." the Joker assures him.

 

When they meet up with Gordon, Blake and the rest of the gang again (and when exactly did they become a gang?), the Joker wears a red T-shirt reading 'Not even my parents know I'm Batman'. Under his Batsuit, Bruce's is wearing the lettering 'When I'm good, I'm really, really good, but when I'm bad, I'm Batman' on green ground, across his chest. A fact that will remain hidden to the world and especially the Joker, if Bruce can prevent it in any way.

*

"You know, if you finish the last milk, the least you could do is put it on the shopping-list." Bruce complains.

"I'm an agent of chaos," the Joker points out. "What do you want?"

*

Batman walks into the trainstation hall that is empty except for Bane's men. He's is trying to make for an impressive entry, when behind him the Joker starts talking, or more precisely rapping.

"Straight out of Gotham, a crazy ass punk, dresses like a bat  
Never squeezes a trigger, so none of you guys will end up dead.  
Come on, Batsy, tell 'em where you're from, straight out of..."

"Gotham?" Bruce asks doubtfully and against better knowledge.

"That's right!"

"What is your obsession with the NWA?"

"There was a great new movie about them. Do you never go to the movies?"

"The movie wasn't that good," Gordon comments. "They left out major biographical details."

"Wow," The Joker looks at Gordon. "You just made your way up to the top of my shit-list. Bypassing both Duela and Catniss."

"Could you stop doing the stupid names?" Selina says.

"Honey, you call yourself 'Catwoman' that leads your entire argument ad absurdum. Why is it people think one-word names are always so catchy? I have to say, I always felt a little bit naked without a surname. But once you've chosen your moniker, there's really no way to back-track on that. I do have a definite article at least, but it's just not the same. Harley made a much better choice there, but then, she's always been the more forsighted of the two of us. And those human-animal combinations... Should I have gone with that too? The Jokercat. That would have been cute. Can I try on your ears for a moment, Selina?"

"No, you can't."

Bruce is torn between attacking the dumbfounded men or listening to the argument. The argument wins.

*

The Joker just got out of the shower. It's beyond weird living together like this.  
He's put on a sweatshirt and low-riding sweatpants with the logo of some gym. His face is makeup-less. Of course. Though, Bruce wouldn't have held it beyond him to come out of the bathroom in full makeup.  
He brushes a towel through his still dripping-wet hair and looks more relaxed than Bruce's ever seen him. Not that he's ever looked tense. But the completely highstrung giddiness is gone. The manic fire that seemed to burn behind his eyes.   
He slouches down on the couch, throwing his legs over an armrest and leafs through the TV-program.

To his greatest mortification and bewilderment, Bruce feels attracted to him.

He wouldn't be surprised if the Joker set up this whole flat just to play him. Work with his expectations. Fuck with his head.

*

It stays with him the following days, shading their every interaction, recoding every look he's ever thrown at the Joker. 

This is getting out of hand. He has to deal with it. So he deflects. Concentrates on that bad feeling he's had ever since he got here. Deals with it the most constructive way he can think of.

"Where the fuck have you been?!" he yells at the Joker, as he once more comes back from destinations unknown.

"Oh, isn't this domestic." The Joker's smile is as broad as it is false. "Me coming home from a hard day's work. And you waiting up for me, asking me how my day was."

"Don't give me that shit! I see right through you. You're up to something."

"Yeah. It's called saving the city."

"Oh really. You're sure as fuck not doing it with me and Gordon. And I haven't seen your posse for days! Where the fuck are they?!"

"My posse? Did you really just say that? I'm not a wannabe-rapper or something."

"You better give me something, or I'll–"

"You what? Cuff me to the refrigerator?"

"I might consider that this alliance has been a waste of time."

"Alright, killjoy. The Penguin is off getting me some contraband into town. Ivy is downtown testing the waters with some of the guys from Blackgate. Duela is out for hairdye, which I can tell you from experience is a bitch getting these days. Hairdye, make-up just the same. Especially if you're going for organic," he goes on, then seems to recall what the topic was. "And Harley said something about Burritos."

Out of all this, except a big load of bullshit, Bruce takes the realisation that, yes, the Joker stopped redying his hair a while ago. Which gets him exactly nowhere. Except a mile deeper into the shit.

*

Bruce sees the dark glances the Joker throws him and Selina. The Joker's always had a weird fascination for him. A little bit more than that, he has to admit, given his current living commodations. Maybe he's completely wrong about this and is going to make a complete fool of himself.

That evening, when they're back at the flat, standing in the kitchen cutting vegetables for a salad, that the Joker insisted needs artichokes in it, Bruce just asks,

"Why do I have the feeling you're hitting on me?"

"Oh, goody! I thought I was maybe being too subtle."

"Really, Joker? Really?"

"Come on, Batsy? What do you think all that was, back then? All the explosions, the threats, the fighting? What else could it have been than courtship?"

"Yeah," Bruce replies numbly. "Stupid me."

"And since your interest in the not-so-law-abiding Ms. Kyle, I thought I might as well just make a go for it."

So, maybe the Joker has a crush on him. That's maybe the most human trait he's shown so far, but what is his excuse for staying here? Oh, right, he's using the Joker to save the city.

Why is he even believing just one word the Joker says? This could all be part of his plan. He's playing him, that's it. Or maybe he's acting just completely irrational. Concerning the Joker that would just make as much sense. One thing he knows for sure, though, he needs to be careful.

*

Bane looks at his men.

"Is that understood?"

"Ah, I still have a question," A voice from the backrow sounds. "How much cool-aid can you drink until you have to throw up?" A shape seperates from the crowd. "I mean does anyone drink it at all these days? You know, 'drink the cool-aid' and everything."

There's stark silence, everyone too perplexed and too afraid of Bane to show any reaction. The Joker just moves on.

"The next question is, are you disfigured? Or are you wearing that mask merely for medical purposes? I have a great weakness for masked heros, or villains that is. Even though I wear masks exclusively for entertainment. So, are you more Deadpool or Darth Vader? Even though, one could argue that in ol' Darthy's case both is valid."

"Who are you, clown?" Bane asks. It's hard to put a finger on the emotion behind it, with the mask obscuring both expression and intonation, but the Joker would go with pissed-off.

"I don't think we've had the pleasure to be introduced so far. I'm the other insane guy in the city."

"I am not insane." Bane says.

"Right! Right!" The Joker nods vigorously. "That's what I always tell them too."

"If you've come here to join our cause, you're in for a dissappointment. But you can have the honor of dying by my hand." Bane says gravely.

The Joker considers that, head cocked to the side. "Nah. Thanks, though."

Bane chuckles, before he nods at his men. "Take him!"

Five of Bane's goons circle the Joker.

"Is any of you at all interested in seeing a magic trick? No? Thought so. No appreciation for art, these days. I bet you guys sit in front of the TV all night and watch 'America's Next Top Model'."

He rams a pencil into the eye of the first to make a grab for him. Then he pours spiritus from a flask onto the next one and sets him on fire.

The guy after that pulls a knife.

"Oh, thank you." The Joker says and takes it from him. He spins around and throws the knife at Bane. Who catches it midair. "Not bad." The Joker concedes happily.

Bane throws the knife at the Joker. The Joker catches it midair. With the back of one of Bane's men.

 

The Joker arrives at Blakes's house the next morning. Where Bruce and the two cops are currently meeting. Lord knows how he knows that they're there. Let alone where John lives.

"Where the fuck were you?!" Bruce demands.

"Miss me?"

"No, I want to know what kind of business you have, stealing yourself away in the middle of the night."

"The best kind."

"I swear to you, if you fuck with me on this–"

"I was just checking in on our common enemy. Introduce myself and a little anarchy." He shrugs. "It only seemed like the polite thing to do."

"You went into his base. Alone. How do you even know where it is?"

"It's pretty much common knowledge that he sat up shop in the sewers. Plus, I'm a big boy. I can look after myself."

"This is not the way this is going to work. No more single-handed actions!"

"Alright, alright. Let's kiss and make up."

Gordon and Blake watch the exchange, with matching grave expressions.

"Why is he so docile all of a sudden?" Blake asks. "Why does he just agree to what Batman tells him to do?"

"He's playing us." Gordon says. "He's playing all of us."

*

The Joker moves past him too close again. Makes Bruce move out of the way, giving no inch himself, his movements a lot more catlike than Selina's ever were. He's smiling, smirking. Knowing exactly what he's doing. Fully intentional.

Bruce isn't really sure how his tongue ends up in the Joker's mouth.

The Joker licks into his mouth, like he's eating from an icecream-container. Both hands holding Bruce's face in place.

Part of him wants to say 'Holy fuck!', but most of him wants to punch the Joker.

Bruce pushes him away. "This is not going to happen."

"It already did."

His mind tells him that he got out of this just in time. But deep down he feels like he just started digging his own grave.

*

The Joker smiles slightly amused the next day, as he leans against the kitchen counter drinking his cup of cocoa, but otherwise doesn't say anything.

And Bruce, Bruce just pretends it never happened. Even though he can still remember the toothpaste flavored taste of the Joker's mouth. Bruce can also imagine what he tasted like that night. Insanity. He's finally lost it.

*

"You are a criminal," Bane makes a dismissive gesture towards the Joker. "While we have a mission."

"Oh yeah, when I wanted to be part of your team so fucking much. But no one invited me. What was your leader's name again? Valar Morghulis? What is this going to be? A game of shadows?"

The Joker is faced with stoney faces. He turns around to Bruce. "That awkward moment, when you realise your audience is too dense to get your jokes." He turns back to the members of the league of shadows. "Seriously, guys, you need. To. Watch. More. TV."

*

"Let me do this." the Joker urges, that slightly crazy but nevertheless oddly persuasive smile on his face.

"I won't let you go anywhere near my cock with that mouth." Bruce states with conviction and disgust.

"But why?" The Joker seems amusedly puzzled instead of offended. "You have no idea how good I am."

"And I have absolutely no wish to find out."

"Is it really such a bad image, me on my knees, with your cock down my throat?" He moves even closer. "Come on, you can tell me." He's leaning closer than Bruce should be comfortable with, his breath brushing across his cheek. "And remember, lying is a bad thing." The last is a whisper.

Bruce swallows against all intentions of betraying no emotion. 

"Yeah," the Joker continues. "I'll swallow too."

And the really bad part is that he wants to do all the things the Joker just described. And the Joker knows, because the Joker always knows. If he didn't already he'd know latest now, when his hand loosely rests on Bruce's hard-on.

"Want me to finish this?" the Joker asks innocently, gleefully, pleased.

"Just fucking do it then." Bruce finally assents with closed eyes.

The Joker's hands brush across his jeans-clad thighs, as he parts them to sink to his knees in front of Bruce. A small chuckle escapes his mouth as he looks up at Bruce, his face on crotch-level. He brushes his hair out of his face, mouth spread into a smile that Bruce would maybe categorize as hungry if he was thinking about it at all. The Joker leans forwards then, mouth, whole face rubbing across Bruce's still jeans-covered crotch. Bruce can feel the lips through the fabric.

"No need to be scared," the Joker says with a wicked smile, as he opens Bruce's jeans. "What could I do to you that I haven't already done?" He presses a kiss to Bruce's thigh.

To Bruce's surprise he then takes a papertowel and wipes the paint off his mouth.

The Joker spits into his palm before he grabs Bruce's dick, rubbing his now paint-free mouth along it, before fitting his mouth around the tip.

Bruce's head hits the wall. His sigh is as much defeat as relief.

The Joker takes him all the way in.

Bruce doesn't think much after that. As he looks at the blond shock of the Joker's head. The pale, strong fingers splayed out on Bruce's hips. And for the first time in months his head is empty. The only demon haunting him, the one just now sucking his brain and probably also his soul out.

He does indeed swallow, as it turns out. Bruce is still unsteadily leaning against the wall, watching the Joker as you'd watch a dangerous animal that might attack you any second. His lips are spit-slick, glistening, rubbed red. Bruce wants to kiss him, wants to fuck him, wants to drag him back to Arkham so he can stop fucking up his life, wants to beg him to stay and keep looking after him, because obviously he can't do that himself anylonger. Because he can't seem to make any decisions of his own anylonger. While the Joker's proven just again, that his decisions seem to turn out pretty well. 

The Joker licks across his fingers, making noises that shouldn't sound as wet and obscene as they do, considering what he's sucked on before.

*

They come upon a mangly boy running from a few men. Selina knocks out the men.

"Don't steal from people you can't outrun." Selina advices.

"Don't blow up people you still want to steal from." the Joker advices.

Selina looks at their surrounding, taking in all the other people fighting over scraps of food, knifes drawn, then back at the Joker.

"You know, I hate to break it to you, but that guy has the whole introducing anarchy business down better than you."

"A little anarchy," the Joker emphazises "It's about a little anarchy. Not complete mayhem."

*

Bruce's gone too far this time. There's bad decisions and then there's that. But maybe they can ignore it, like they've done the past days. They're good at that. Impossible to tell something's wrong. If it wasn't for Bruce watching the Joker's every step inside the flat, like a caged tiger.

*

The Joker stares at Selina.

"Just so we both know where we're standing." He says. "If you ever touch my man again, I'll break your face."

Selina looks at Bruce in surprise. "Bruce, I had no idea!"

Bruce raises his hands in a panicked, scrambling gesture, like reaching for a toppling bucket of water when you already splashed it all over you. Or maybe that's just what he feels like. He probably looks more like he's redirecting traffic.

"Nothing that's coming out of his mouth, is in any way rooted in reality!"

"Oh, you mean like that time, when your dick was coming out of my mouth?" The Joker asks innocently.

"Can you– can you just–" Bruce groans and buries his face in his hands.

"Off you go, kitty-cat." The Joker makes a clawing gesture towards Selina.

"You know what, my bad." She turns on her definitely not sensible heels.

 

"What the fuck was that?!" Bruce asks, too dumbfounded to muster the appropriate amount of anger. "You can't just call dibs on people!"

The Joker gives him a once-over. "Honey, I called dibs on you a long time ago."

*

Bruce has barely slumped down on the couch, when the Joker already crawls over to him, systematically pulling his clothes off, throwing his combat-boots across the room without looking, after pulling them off.

"Joker," Bruce cautions. "Joker!"

"Are we still going to pretend this isn't going to happen again?"

Bruce grabs the Joker's face. Not gently, fingers digging into the scar tissue on his cheeks. Forcibly he turns the Joker's face up to look at him.

"You and me are enemies. And you will keep your dirty fingers to yourself. Don't think I've forgotten who you are. Don't think I've forgotten Rachel."

The Joker's hand snakes up to Bruce's crotch, squeezing the hardness that Bruce is well aware of. The skin under Bruce's fingers is stretched taut, as the Joker's mouth pulls into a grin.

"So, this is all for Rachel then?"

Bruce punches the Joker in the stomach. He doubles over. Bruce is over him immediately, hand closing around his throat, not yet pressing. The Joker takes in a few labored breaths, before he arches up his hips, one leg pushing between Bruce's, grinding against him.

"Oh God, yeah!" the Joker moans. Bruce can feel his Adam's apple against his palm as he swallows. "You wanna fuck me?" the Joker asks then. "You can have me whichever way you want."

Bruce feels his hips involuntarily twitch.

The Joker groans. "Oh, yeah. I want you inside me."

Bruce lets go of the Joker, stumbling back to his feet.

"Stay the fuck away from me!"

He ends up once in the bathroom and once in the pantry before he manages to find his way back to his room.

*

Miranda Tate is the last source of sanity in his world right now. And when she kisses him, he holds onto it like a lifeline. So what if he doesn't feel what he feels when the Joker as much as brushes past him. Nothing has to feel like that, nothing should feel like that. This, this right here, grounds him. That's what he needs, not a rush to his head.

They spend the night at his house, together on the floor in front of the fireplace. And it's calm, it's peaceful, it's everything that the Joker isn't. It's not the Joker's place, which Bruce has become so accostumed to staying at even though he shouldn't. And all of that makes it good. Makes it the best possible decision.

And then he feels the gun pressing into his gut. And he knows within one instant that this is not a misunderstanding, nothing he could still salvage. No, that right here the last good and sane thing has turned to dust, has never been there to begin with. Just a mask. At least the Joker's mask doesn't try to hide what he is.

"Miranda," Bruce looks at her, the betrayal visible in his features.

"Poor Bruce, you never saw it coming." She pats his cheek. "I guess you just shouldn't have killed my father." There's a steady pressure on his shoulder and he sinks to his knees in stupefied acceptance of his fate. She kicks him in the ribs for good measure.

"You know, honestly, I didn't see it coming either."

Both Miranda and Bruce's heads jerk around.

"Now, the party don't start till I walk in." The Joker gives a twist of his hips, dropping the broken doorknob. 

Miranda looks at the Joker with disbelief. "I don't remember inviting you to this party."

"Yeah, I know. My invitation usually gets lost in the mail."

She doesn't waste another breath to point her gun at the Joker.

"Yeah, about that." He licks his index tracing it through a line of light that becomes only visible when hitting his finger. "See those little red dots. Those ain't fireflies." He flicks his tongue on the last word.

Immediately her gun moves back to Bruce's temple. "Think they can shoot me before I take him out? Something tells me you're not willing to take that risk."

"Smart call, girl." The Joker concedes. "Now, where does that leave us?" The Joker rocks up and down on his feet, stretching his arms behind his back with a loud pop. "Well, first of all, on a personal note, I really do not appreciate the nonchalance with which you help yourself to my stuff. I know, I know," The Joker raises his hands in placation. "We're criminals and you can't just call dibs on a city just because you saw it first. But, come on, bitch. A little house call, just to be on the polite side, before you shit all over my gardenias wouldn't have been too much to ask, now would it? No, I don't think so."

The Joker has to commend her for the unwavering grip she has on her gun, the same can't be said for her facial features though.

"What... What do you even want?!" she asks completely flabbergasted.

"First of all to take your gun out of my guy's beautiful face. Everything else you don't have to worry about, I'll kill you later anyway."

"You think so?" she mocks.

"We'll see how it'll turn out, won't we?" The Joker smiles. "Now, get the fuck out of here. I don't have to tell you that if you use that gun, there won't be enough left of you for the guy with the mask to identify."

Miranda drags Bruce to the backdoor, where she pushes him away and bolts.

 

She escapes. The Joker lets her. Would be a shame for all of this to be over too soon.

 

"You should know that by now, Brucey," the Joker says tenderly, running a finger across Bruce's cheek. "No one's allowed to hurt you but me. And I promise I'll be nice to you."

"Joker." Bruce says quietly, bringing one hand up to the Joker's face. The Joker only smiles. Bruce moves closer. "Joker." he repeats in the same uncanny voice that's for once free of hostility. Bruce's other hand grabs the Joker by the waistband of his jeans and pulls him towards him with one sharp tug. Their lips meet in a unpremeditatedly soft and chaste kiss. Bruce rakes a hand through the Joker's hair. "What am I supposed to do with you?" He rubs his knuckles against the Joker's skull. Bruce is smiling himself now.

The door gets pushed open and hits the wall with a loud clang. Harley comes barging through.

"I did some background research on our friend Bane and turns out he and Ms. Tate go way back."

"Thanks a buck for yesterday's news, lovely!" the Joker greets her.

Bruce looks between the Joker and Harley.

"Out for Burritos, huh?"

"Oh, I did get Burritos too." Harley says, holding out a plastic bag.

 

"What now?" The Joker asks once Harley has left again, hands in his pockets, looking lean and young and very much like he should be done right now. "Wanna run now, little black riding hood?"

"No, I don't think I will." Bruce moves closer, taking the Joker's chin between his fingers.

They fuck in Bruce's house. At the same place he'd slept with Miranda earlier. No more sanctuary. No more space to keep the Joker at bay, who's now infected every part of Bruce's life. And right now in front of the dying ambers of the fireplace, it feels more like he's cleansing this place, like he's cleansing himself. Of her. When the Joker's touch is so much more in every way. Why did he even try to keep this place save from the Joker? He can't protect himself from the Joker. No one can.

He doesn't even feel how the room slowly cools down, as he finally fullfills the Joker's wish. It's not as violent as one would expect. They're both calm. As if in trance. Shadows dancing over their bodies as they kneel on the blankets in front of the fire. Slow, steady touches. Moving with each other. Determined and still like they're in a dream. Muscles splaying for a moment as he throws the Joker onto his back, but then soft touches again. It's like they both know exactly how it's going to be. A trancelike choreographie. Lazy. Patient. Trapped in a timeless place.

 

"You did not run." the Joker says later, as they're both wrapped into the blankets.

"I did not."

*

The Joker presses the button, blowing up the tanks of the soldiers blocking the bridge.

"Oh my goodness!" he then exclaims, knocking onto the side of an overturned tank. "Is anyone hurt?" He turns around. "These are pretty much mashed potatoes." the Joker points out to the kids of the orphanage and their teachers. "But you should probably still leg it."

 

"He just helped us getting fifty children out of the city. I think it's time you accept that he isn't the problem here." Bruce tells to Gordon's stony face. Good Lord, is he seriously advocating the Joker now?

*

The Joker's most certainly crazy. Everything he does shows it again. But oddly enough it is to help him, this time. The Joker who doesn't seem to be scared of anything. Least of all Bane. Or the chance of dying in this city, by mass-destruction weapons from the military.  
It's reassuring, in a way. And Bruce needed that. He really did. The washed-out remains of him that had given up by the time the Joker showed up at his door (or more precisely in his living room).  
The Joker gives him the feeling that they're going to make it out of here. The sex. The fighting just the same. The joking. The Joker takes him on, just like he does the rest of the world. A 'no' is never taken into account, much less an 'impossible'. As fierce as he is in bed, he's easy-going in war, taking nothing and no-one serious. And why should he? Nothing can touch him. No one can hurt him. An explosion makes him smile. A punch turns him on. And really, it's not a seldom occurence that the Joker wants to fuck after another run-in with Bane or his men.  
How is Bruce supposed to be scared when he's with that man? If he is man at all. Much more of a Pan, a puck, a sprite. A creature of fire and destruction. Yet, so good-naturedly about it.

*

Bruce never wished for his tumbler more than when riding in the Joker's car, together with Duela and John on the backseat while the Joker and Harley sit in the front. 'Sorry for Party Rocking' blaring from the speakers, Duela chiming in whenever the hook comes on.

*

Batman walks into the abandoned courtroom. In which Scarecrow is now holding trials for Bane.

It is, of course, the Joker who starts talking first.

"Friends. Romans. Countrymen. And everyone else not sitting on a cushion. Do we want to respect the jurisdiction of this man anylonger?"

 

They leave again later, after the Joker managed in ways that are still beyond Bruce to break up that entire disturbing excuse of a courthouse.

"You know what, Joker? Some days I'm not even sure you're insane."

"Sorry 'bout that. Just tell me right away and I'll work on it."

*

Batman watches Bane with a stony expression as the other rants on. Then he nudges the Joker with his elbow.

"What is he saying?" he asks with a frown.

"I don't know, something about pins and needles, I think..." the Joker replies.

"No, I'm pretty sure that's not it." Batman shakes his head.

He's having too much fun these days, more fun than saving the city from lunatic criminals has any right to be.

*

If this was a story it would be 'The one in which the Batman makes irresposible decisions concerning his dating situation and criminals and police form a community of fate and actually have fun together'.

The Joker is standing on stage singing 'Are you feeling me' from Aliyah, including all the dance moves. It's karaoke night at one of the Penguin's clubs. How any of the clubs is even still open at times like this would have puzzled him once upon a time. But after everything he's experienced these past weeks he just accepts it as a fact.

"I know in my heart, I know in my mind, we were meant to be. Boy, are you feeling me? Cause I'm feeling you."

Is he pointing at him? Bruce takes a cautionary step to the side, making room for a cheering and blushing Duela.

Selina starts hooting beside him, "That's right! Pick it up!"

*

They're on a tight schedule and carrying unstable explosives (a category in which the Joker should maybe be included) when the man himself decides that he wants a snack.

"No, no, no. Wait." The Joker holds up a finger. "Are you trying to tell me, you don't have chicken club sandwich?" He asks the deli owner.

"We... we aren't even open, sir." answers the man who made the mistake of opening the door.

"What, because of that ruckus out there?" The Joker waves his gun in the general direction of the door.

The woman starts crying now.

"Alright then. I'll take a bombay chicken sandwich." the Joker concedes.

Batman shows up behind him.

"Don't worry, he's not going to harm you." Bruce tells the dispairing couple.

*

They're in the sewers, when Batman finally corners Bane. As it turns out, though, it is Bane who has cornered the Batman. He feels painfully inadequate in their fight, losing ground with every passing minute.

Bruce is on the ground, trying to catch his breath. His whole body is hurting.

"Oh, you think darkness is your ally. But you merely adopted the dark." Bane tells him, gloating as he saunters up and down in front of his fallen form. "I was born in it, moulded by it. I didn't see the light until I was already a man, by then it was nothing to me but BLINDING!"

There's clapping echoing through the tunnel. A shape separates from the darkness.

"I really liked that, I do. You really put a lot of emotions behind that. But your whole plan, that's just so... yesterday. Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. You know, been there, done that. And you could have gotten through with it, too. I really mean that. It's a good plan. It was my plan after all. But, the problem is, now you've got to deal with me. And I'm an agent of chaos. You could say it moulded me."

Bruce watches as Bane flings the Joker off like swatting away a fly. The Joker bounces right back to his feet, brushing dust and dirt off, laughing hysterically.

"You have nothing," the Joker muses. "Nothing to threaten me with. Nothing to do with all your strength." The Joker saunters towards Bane. "You know, your problem is all that high-ground bullshit. What happened to violence for violence's sake? Don't pretend you're anything you aren't, cupcake. Gotham won't fall, because it's my playground. And you won't break my bat. Because, possessive pronoun."

"How do you plan to stop me, clown?" Bane asks, derisively.

"I have to say, I'm rather fond of darkness too. But the problem is, there's no darkness, if everything's burning."

Explosions go off around them.

Bruce vaguely thinks that he should talk to the Joker about not solving every problem with explosives. But, then again, it worked. And Bruce is hurting in far too many places at the same time, to consider taking any highground today.

"Come on, Batsy-boo. Are you hurting anywhere specifically?" the Joker asks, as he helps Bruce back on his feet.

 

"You didn't have to save me." Bruce says, when they've finally made it back to the Joker's place. He's slumped down on the couch, feeling especially pathetic, while everything hurts.

"I thought we are a team now?" the Joker replies.

"What is your game?" Bruce asks defeated, finally giving up at trying to unravel this, finally tired of playing along.

"Except getting those fuckers out of my town and you into my pants? Nothing as of now." The Joker shrugs.

Bruce reaches up and pulls the Joker down to him. The kiss is lasting, Bruce not letting go, still both hands savely on either side of the Joker's face that is devoid of make-up, as usual these days. As if the Joker doesn't need it in this apocalypse. As if there's no more point to be made. As if there's no more need for masks, in this kingdom of grime, where every bad guy is just the same.

Sex is out of the question, the state he's in. But he still doesn't let go of him. Presses him against his body, arms snaked around him. Holding the Joker as close as possible, when usually any expression of affection of any form between them was solely done through sex. Except, no, that's not true. The Joker's expressing his affection in a lot of ways. Most of them even relatively sane.

 

Harvey Dent and Rachel. Fallen victim, meaninglessly, to this lunatic in his bed. And nevertheless, he stays where he is. And he has no excuse. But he has no one to offer it up to either. Except maybe Alfred. But he barely sees him these days. He'll deal with his judging gaze when all this is over. If the world's still moving in the same circles by then.

 

"Were you ever in love?" The Joker asks.

Bruce still feels too beaten up for that kind of conversation. There should be an obvious answer to that, nevertheless Bruce tells the heartfelt truth. "No. Not really. You?"

"Yeah. Many, many years."

"Is this some weird shit about being in love with chaos?"

The Joker laughs, "Nope, but hold that thought."

"Who then? Harley?"

"It's funny that you'd be asking that. She figured it out much quicker." The Joker laughs even harder. "Figure it out yourself."

*

"Master Wayne, he is not the answer. There is a word for the state you are in at the moment. It's called depression. That man is not the answer."

Of course Alfred knows. God alone knows how.

"You know, I think he might actually be."

Bruce didn't intend to say that.

*

"Do you want to kill me?" The Joker asks.

"I thought we'd called a truce?"

"Given none of this had happened and you wouldn't need me. Come on, answer the question!"

"No. Not really."

*

What on earth is he doing? Relying on that man as much as he does. Finding a piece of calm here more and more often.

*

"Either you like him, or not!" Harley states. "It's that easy. Trust me, with a guy like him there's no such thing as middle ground." She glares at him. "And trust me on another thing, If you hurt him again, I will make sure the only other time he will be hurt because of you, is the time when he finds your corpse."

"What do you mean 'again'?" Bruce asks angrily. "I arrested him because he was trying to destroy the city!"

"Oh God, I can't believe I fell in love with a moron that fell in love with such a moron."

*

What the Joker doesn't get, though, is that Bruce watches him and Harley equally jealously. Despite neither of them seeming to define what they have as a relationship, they are still close enough to be practically feeding out of each other's mouth. And obviously, the Joker tells her everything, which makes Bruce squirm thinking about what he must have told her about the two of them.

And he shouldn't have any feelings of such sort for the Joker. No claim. But that's the problem when you suddenly click with another person. So unexpectedly. And it feels so easily so natural, that you have to remind yourself that it is anything but that.

*

The man, commonly known as the Penguin, looks at him. "Do you have any idea who Jack Napier is?!"

"I think I have a pretty good idea."

"I doubt it. You know shit about that crazy little fucker. If Harvey Dent didn't teach you to stay the fuck away from him, you're as crazy as he is. I don't know what you're thinking in that vigilante, do-gooder mind of yours, but you can't save Jack Napier. Not only doesn't he want you to, no, you just can't. Harleen tried. You can see how that turned out."

"You knew him before he became the Joker."

"Yeah, boy. I did."

"What changed? What happened?"

"Don't you think those doctors at Arkham haven't done their fair share of analyzing that? I won't do their job for them. Some people are just crazy. Why is it you think you have what it takes to fix him? You of all people! Just because he likes to follow you around?"

"I'm not trying to fix him. I just want to know what he was like."

The Penguin shakes his head again, pensive.

"Saw that face and those scars back then and thought maybe a hustler gotten on the wrong side of a john or a pimp. Told all kind of tales even back then. Told him to kill a guy for me to join my ranks. Looked at me. Thought on it. Then told me I'd have to give him a little more than that." The Penguin laughs fondly, then continues. "Told me his daddy'd done his face. But I reckoned 'twas bullshit. Scars didn't look old enough."

"Are you going to tell me now that he's like the son you never had?" Bruce asks with disgust.

"Hell no! I have sons. They're all useless, partying idiots, spending my money while pretending to be studying abroad. No. I'd kill him the first chance I'd get. Because sooner or later he's going to do the exact same to me."

"So, you got nothing to tell me."

"If I did, why the fuck would I tell you? He's maybe crazy, but we still got a shitload more common ground than I got with you! Why do you care so much anyway?! Shit, one could think you're exactly as obsessed with him as he's with you." The Penguin shakes his head in what might be disgust or might be pity.

And Bruce is left exactly where he started. With the question what exactly he feels for the Joker. And what that makes him.

*

"What do you want? What do you want out of this?!" Bruce asks, arms stretched out in surrender. "Are you just that bored?!"

"Nope."

Bruce waits. No elaboration.

"That's it? That's all you have to say?!"

"Not by far. What would you like? Love? Affection? Fatal attraction?"

"No."

"For the guy who's eagerly participating in this, you are awfully antagonistic. Maybe you should give that some thought. Is it so unbelievable that someone could like you enough to want to keep you?" the Joker asks.

*

"Do you like Mr. Joker?" Melinda asks.

"What?" Bruce asks flabbergasted. "What do you mean?"

"You like him like my mommy and my daddy like each other?"

Is it honestly that obvious? Bruce sincerely hopes not. "Yeah. I guess I do." 

And what's it say about him that he can admit something to a five year old that he can't even admit to himself.

*

"Christmas seven years ago." The Joker prompts.

"What?"

"What were you doing that day?"

Bruce contemplates for a while. "I was giving a lame-ass party?"

"Uh-huh. I know, keep thinking. What else happened that evening?"

Bruce thinks again, his brows furrowing, before he looks back at the Joker.

"That was you!"

"Yes!" The Joker's eyes light up with relief.

"That was you! That blow-up in the old warehouse! All those mobster-drugs! That was you!"

"Oh Jesus." The Joker shakes his head, exasperated. "Well, it's nice to know I made an impression."

*

They're once again trying to figure out how to get back into the armory at Wayne Enterprises.

"There has to be another way to get in there."

"I had copies of the construction-plans at my house."

"Let's get your shit then." The Joker walks ahead.

 

The Joker doesn't wait for an invitation to Bruce's house. But then he didn't the last time either. When he saved his ass.

He walks through Bruce's mansion like he lives there, snooping in all the corners. Well, Bruce guesses, he deserves it, given that he did the same at the Joker's place. Even though, the Joker didn't seem to mind it. But when did he ever?

"No, I didn't hide top-secret construction plans under my bed." Bruce points out, irritatedly.

"I'm looking for sex-toys." The Joker informs him. What he finds instead, in a very promising looking shoe-box, is –very anticlimatic– a shoe. Not just any shoe, though. It's a single, purple shoe. Patent-leather. "Oh my, exotic choice of foot-wear. Do you wear them on only one foot these days?"

"It's not mine." Bruce points out, squirming.

"No, let me guess, it was already here when you moved in? A friend lent it to you?"

"It's just something I kept some years ago and never really got to throwing away."

"That's all very mysterious. How exactly did you get into the possession of this remarkable fashion-statement?"

"I'm not really sure what business of yours that would be."

"You tell me how you got this shoe, I'll tell you how I got my scars." The Joker smiles, triumphantly.

"For real?"

"Not joking."

"You go first."

"Nope."

"I'm not going to fall for this trick."

"I promise."

"Yeah, sure."

"I'm not lying, Bruce. I promise, when we're done here, you'll know my deepest, darkest secret."

"Okay..." Bruce stalls a moment longer. "Someone left that shoe at a party. Actually, that party seven years ago."

"And you held onto it for them? For seven years? I'm sorry to break it to you, but I don't think she will pick it up again."

"Him."

"Excuse me?"

"Don't play dumb, Joker. You've basically stalked me, you don't have to act like you don't know I sleep with men. Besides you, obviously."

"And you slept with that one?"

"No. But I would have liked to." Bruce retorts, defiantly.

"Ah, so you stole his shoe, while he ran from you, covering his ass?"

"Why does everything in your world always have to be so weird?"

"You like it." The Joker smiles.

Bruce snorts. "I certainly don't."

"No, no, seriously. You do." The Joker smirks. He walks over to the bar, mixing some stuff together.

"Fancy a drink?" The Joker hands him a glass of suspiciously greenish liquid.

Bruce takes a sip, despite better knowledge. After all, the Joker is drinking it too.

"God! That's bad. That's... That's nasty." He knows that taste though.

"Mango-absinth." The Joker says innocently.

Bruce doesn't say anything for a long time. 

What he says then is. "Fuck." And then. "That can't possibly be. That can't have been you."

"At the police station, the night your parents died, there was a boy humming Jingle Bells. At the party you crashed at 16, you kissed a boy for the first time. That night at the The Stacked Deck, before you had to pretend in front of your company board that you were actually a responsible adult, you tried to get into a guy's pants by telling him that you're Bruce Wayne, while actually carrying with you a fake-id that said you were in fact Jamal Chastity O'Keefe Junior. And that Christmas party, you know all about."

Bruce is silent once more.

"We never met at the The Stacked Deck." He then says resolutely.

The Joker gasps indignated. "That stupid photo booth was even your idea!"

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Bruce shakes his head vehemently. "That can't have been you. I don't know how–"

"Oh yes. Was. Is. And will be, forevermore."

"You...What kind of sick... You couldn't have done that all by yourself– Who is behind this?!"

"Behind what? A chance meeting? Don't take yourself so serious, Bruce." There's clear distaste and anger in the Joker's eyes now. "No one planned to ruin you since your childhood. No one has been inserting undercover-agents of darkness into your life. What you did, you did yourself. No one pushed you in my direction. For once things are exactly what they are."

"Why?"

"Why what? Why I approached you? Why you wanted me?"

"I never wanted you!" Bruce shakes his head violently.

"Oh you do, sweetheart. You did then, you do now. Every single time. There was no need for me to invest particular effort. You were eager enough, weren't you?" The Joker gives a disgusted snort. "And on that night you don't remember," He continues, malicious smile. "where that picture was taken, you fucked me."

"That's easy to say, since I remember nothing."

"And how very convenient is that, isn't it? What's it matter anyway? Since you've fucked me quite a few times since then." The smile of the Joker widens again, making him once again look more like the man who blew up banks and whatever else caught his fancy. Then his body language changes again wholly. The Joker moves closer, voice nearly a whisper now, sensuously low. "You liked me all those times. What about this time?" It's a smile of a different sort this time, he knows he's won. "Yeah, I think you do." And at the same time, as he licks his lips and turns his face, baring his throat, Bruce knows he could ask anything of him now. For the Joker a fight is seldomly about winning.

Bruce grabs the Joker, pulling him on top of him, so he's straddling him, just to lift him up and spin them around, the Joker's back hitting the wall. Bruce' mouth moves forward, lips searching for the Joker's, while his hands are still grabbing the man's hips, ass, thighs, whatever he can reach without losing his grip on him. The Joker's lips meet his without hesitation, before he breaks the kiss, pulling his shirt over his head. Bruce moves down without even realising it, lips running over the Joker's chest.

"Oh God," The Joker leans his head back against the wall. "Get your pants off already and fuck me."

But for a moment, Bruce just stares at the man in front of him, who he knows and doesn't know at all. Can't believe all he's just heard. Looks at the Joker, Jack, like he's seeing him for the first time. Knew that name for some time now and still knew nothing at all.

"Wow, you really don't remember, do you?" the Joker asks him, glazed-over frenzy having left his eyes for now.

"Back then, I hope nothing untoward happened." Bruce states carefully.

"Did you really just say 'I hope nothing untoward happened'? Bruce, it was you and me having sex! Of course a lot of untoward things happened. Even though I wasn't quite the Joker yet and you were still miles away from Batman." The Joker watches him. Deep, unfathomable eyes that as always seem to see so much more than they let on. Then he leans in, one hand around Bruce's neck, "But, seriously, you just effectively killed the mood."

"I doubt that anyone's ever managed to kill the mood with you."

And of course it hasn't. And Bruce fucks him. Because he's effectively proven he can't deny the Joker in this. Even now when his brain is running a mile a minute, the Joker's body stops him in track. Calling, demanding, securing all his attention. And for the first time he thinks how is he supposed to go without this once the Joker's back at Arkham. Which on the other hand means he's for the first time considering that there will be an after Bane.

 

It's not exactly afterglow, but it's probably as close as it gets. Even though, for the Joker, Bruce assumes, afterglow would have to involve at least something burning.

"Why the hell did you dress up like that?" Bruce asks the ceiling, his arm still around the man in question.

"It was a costume party." the Joker replies amused.

"Why didn't you tell me that I know you?"

"Yeah, that would have been flattering. 'Hey I'm the guy from five years ago that you never called.'"

"Because running after me is so much more dignified."

"Ouch."

The Joker laughs, running his nails over Bruce's Egyptian cotton sheets.

It's the bed he lay in with Rachel. Maybe it would have felt more excusable had it happened in the Joker's bed, in his domain. But it also feels fitting that it should happen here. More definite. More sincere. There's no more way to keep the two worlds apart. The memory of Rachel and the undeniable presence of the Joker.

"Why'd you leave that shoe?"

The Joker shrugs. "It's romatic. You thought so too, you kept it."

"How was I supposed to find you, based on your shoe?" Bruce looks at him, disbelievingly.

"Oh, I don't know. Did you even try?"

"As a matter of fact, I did." Bruce confesses.

*

"When did that happen?" Bruce asks, mimicking the locations of the scars on his own face.

"What do you mean? In the wonderful four years between 16 and 20?"

It feels weird knowing the history they both share without Bruce having known, without him really wanting to own up to it. But fact is, he chose the Joker. Over and over again.

"Tell me." Bruce demands gently, one hand tracing the real scars now. "You promised."

"I only promised my worst secret." The Joker dodges, still half-smiling.

"I'm your worst secret?" Bruce asks, voice still soft. Saddened. "Worse than having your face cut open?"

"You assume it was done to me." The Joker still doesn't escape Bruce's hold on him. "Who says I didn't do it myself?"

"Why would you do that?"

"Insane, remember?" The corners of his mouth edge up again, tentatively still. As if he isn't quite sure yet he means it as a joke.

"I don't believe that."

"That I'm insane?" Now it's his eyebrows that move up. "I've heard you say differently on many an occasion."

"That you would do that to yourself."

"I like pain." The Joker states very seriously.

"Maybe so," Bruce leans in even closer, dark eyes watching every single emotion that splays over the Joker's face. "I'm not yet sure about that either."

"What a shame." The Joker meets his eyes without hesitation. Never once hesitating.

"Nevertheless. Tell."

"Maybe I got attacked at the looney-bin, maybe some guy at prison didn't like my face, maybe I tried to eat with a really big spoon. Does it matter?"

"Obviously."

"Bruce, honestly, these scars didn't make me who I am." The Joker shakes his head, exasperated. "Maybe I instrumentalized them. But they mean nothing to me. They only have as much meaning as people are willing to credit them. I never put much in them, but I like that others do. They look at me and they think that these scars signify who I am. And imagination is as much of a mask as paint is. Only it has no limits. The bats didn't make you Batman. And nevertheless you chose them as your symbol. But you're not wearing the suit to signify that you can overcome fear. You wear it because it scares people. Because that's why we put on masks. To make people love us, or to make people fear us."

*

So, he knew him before. So, they're maybe destined to be together. That doesn't change a fact. Doesn't bring back just one of the Joker's victims.  
Who do you want to make happy? A treacherous voice asks. Yourself or just the public opinion?

*

"That's just a fixation." Bruce says gently. "That's not love. You just projected something onto me because we shared that moment back then."

"What about you then? What about all the other moments we had? Or was it just that you like to fuck me?"

"I didn't even remember fucking you that night."

"Oh yeah. The infamous blackout."

"What did I do that night that you want me to remember?"

"I would like you to remember me, you jerk." There's exasperation with a tint of pain. "Is that so hard to understand?"

"I really don't remember. Anything about that night. I didn't even know how I got home in the morning." Bruce says earnestly, beseechingly.

"The fucking photo strip." The Joker bursts out suddenly. "It was your fucking idea. What the hell happened to it?"

"What?" Bruce looks confused.

"You had one too. We made two. Did you just throw it away? Did you wake up in the morning, found it and just threw it away? Or did you already lose it on the way back?"

"I don't know." Bruce says helplessly. "But I kept the shoe. And," He snorts self-deprecatingly. "I never returned your file either."

"Did you now?" A small smile lights up on the Joker's face.

*

"If this were a fairytale, all those meetings would mean we're destined to be together." the Joker states profoundly.

"And in reality it means that you're a crazy stalker and I'm somehow attracted to you."

"I don't even know why I wanted you all these years." the Joker says pensively, like he really doesn't know. "It's not like you're so special. And that special connection bullshit couldn't be further from the truth. But everytime I met you, I liked you more. It's not just the chase. And if we're honest it's always been me chasing you."

He speaks then. He owes the Joker this much honesty. When he's been brave enough to show such weakness in front of him. "You always seemed so cool. Each time. Like you couldn't care about all the others. Like you really didn't. While I was only pretending to. That was the reason why I danced with you back then. At the prom. At Christmas. Even back then at the police station. And I'm sure that was also the reason I wanted to take the photos, back then." A pause. "Also, you're incredibly hot. I mean, honestly, it's hard to miss that."

Now the sound of the Joker's laughter fills the room. His eyes are almost squeezed shut, eyes crinkling at the corners. It's a light and happy sound.

*

Bruce watches Alfred warily, whenever he brings the Joker to Wayne Manor. Alfred never says anything anylonger. He doesn't have to. They discussed the Joker to completion a long time ago. Bruce knows what Alfred thinks of him. He feels Alfred's eyes on him whenever he interacts with Jack.

 

Alfred does speak this time, when the Joker leaves the room.

"Maybe he should stay a little longer." Alfred says.

Bruce just stares at Alfred unsure what exactly Alfred is getting at here.

"I'd be the last person, to deny you a little bit of happiness, Master Wayne." Alfred then says.

*

"I would have never believed you would let her die. Honestly." The Joker says. "Hoped, of course. But never believed it."

Bruce's fist hits him in the face.

"You don't get to talk about her."

"I think I do. Actually."

"Because you killed her? Or because I fucked you?" Bruce asks with a sneer. "Because neither gives you that right."

"So far you seem to have been pretty taken by me." the Joker retorts with a lazy smile.

"Maybe I'm just taking what I need to pass the time. You said it yourself, running after someone doesn't make you very attractive. It's a little desperate."

"Oh, insults now? You know what that does to me, baby."

"You disgust me."

"Kiss me," the Joker urges, all wet lips and hungry eyes. "Please."

Bruce wants to bury his hands in the blond curls, wants to pull. Hard. Bite the lips that look far too lush. Wants those eyes to flutter shut. Wants those lips to moan his name.

But a part of him is getting atuned to the Joker's moves, his sudden urges to provoke. Pushes and pulls ending in semi-violent sex. He's not sure what Jack's trying to assert here. But he's learned enough about this to stop himself from just reacting, from giving the Joker exactly the reaction he's aiming for, to instead ask himself what his motivation is. What kind of need he is trying to fill here. Is it jealousy? Insecurity? One thing he knows for sure. The Joker doesn't just want to watch the world burn.

*

They take him to another nightclub. He's learned by now that for the Joker and his comrades, saving the city always means not neglecting to have some fun.  
It's easy to guess what kind of clientele goes there, given the state the town is in. Bruce sees familiar faces all around, good that they don't know him without his batsuit.

Jack is wearing a black suit, his hair slicked back with grease, looking more polished than he ever has. Harley is wearing a red polka-dot dress, spinning around on red, glossy high-heels the color of her hair. They dance to 'You don't own me'. Standard. It looks good. Like they actually know what they're doing, with an easy fluidity that Bruce had to invest a small fortune to at least mimick at galas. 

The masses have parted leaving a circle in the midst of the dancefloor, surrounded by dining tables where the lowest of the city are having a nice evening out. They look perfect together. Poised. Perfectly in sync. Like there's no one else but them in the room, when Jack swings her low to the floor, her hair brushing the parquet, one of her legs hooked around his thigh.

Bruce always feels uneasy about watching those two together. The woman who knows everything about Jack. Who embraces his way of life, encourages it, when Bruce tries to retain some sort of damage-control with him. It's like they're both pulling on Jack in opposite directions. This woman will always be in Jack's life. If Bruce wants to be part of it he has to get used to that.

 

Jack looks at him funny, when they return home that night.

"Where you jealous earlier?" He asks with a small, disbelieving smile.

"Maybe I was," Bruce replies.

"You deserve it." The Joker says. "I've been jealous for years."

"I don't know what you think," Bruce says. "But there's really nothing going on with me and Selina. Not for a while now."

"There better not be."

*

The Joker walks into the room, taking the gun Bruce was just cleaning from his hands. With a graceful moves he straddles Bruce's lap. His arms wrap around Bruce's neck as he leisurely trails his lips across Bruce's face.

Bruce's hands wander under the Joker's shirt, running up his back.

"I was there before Rachel." the Joker whispers in his ear. It's not petulant. It's not a reminder. It's a declaration.

*

The Joker arches closer to him, his legs cross over Bruce's back, pulling him even closer. His arms reach up and cling around Bruce's neck, one hand snaking into his hair, as he kisses him. Desperate. Wanting.

Bruce breaks their kiss, tracing his thumb over the Joker's lips, watching him closely. Watching his eyes, wide, needing, lost in him. Cups his face and kisses him again. Wants to give him whatever he needs so desperately. Whatever he seems to see in Bruce. Wants desperately to be whatever the Joker thought him up to be. Wants this to be real.  
It's still hard to take, how the Joker looks at him, like he's what he's wanted all his life. He doesn't know if he can live up to that. He doesn't know if he wants to live up to that. But maybe, maybe the Joker is what he has wanted all his life too. All those weird incidences. All that horrible attraction.

Right now, their bodies pressed to each other, connected for a little while longer, feels more perfect than it has any right to. More perfect than the Joker has any right to feel.

 

He looks at him, as they lie beside each other. The Joker looks half-asleep already, curled up, no sheet covering his still naked body, as the sweat slowly dries on him. 

He addresses the Joker. "Have you ever felt about someone like you really, really don't want to hurt them? Like you want to protect them?"

"Of course," the Joker replies, all of a sudden clear-eyed and wide awake. All attention focused on Bruce. The way he always is around Bruce. Always all attention on him. Every second. Like it would be a shame to miss just one moment.

"Me?"

"You and Harley."

He rolls on top of the Joker again, both hands on either side of his head. "Maybe we should try doing this, Jack. I think we actually owe this an honest try."

*

"My daddy–" Melinda starts.

"Your daddy, sweetheart, is either dead or left you to die in that stadium." the Joker explains.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!" Bruce exclaims.

"What? It's the truth. You want me to lie to her?"

"That's a child you're talking to. Yes, for God's sake, lie!"

"What did lies ever do for anyone? When this is over her daddy will still be dead or will have left her behind. The truth is called ugly for a reason. But it's called the truth for a reason too. It stays true even if you're too weak to face it."

*

"Anyone want to see a magic trick?" The Joker asks into the round, as they're once more face with an assortment of Bane's and Miranda's goons.

"No," Bruce answers before anyone else, with exasperation in his voice. "Nobody wants to see a magic trick. Nobody."

"Alright, buzzkill, if you want everyone to be as moody and depressed as you are."

*

The Joker turns to Selina. "That's because he likes to paint himself as the misunderstood, abused hero, so he can have an excuse to continue wallowing in self pity."

"I wouldn't have a reason to, if you hadn't killed her."

"Like she would have made you happy. Like she could have. And, hey, you had a fair chance of saving her."

"Drop fucking dead, Jack."

*

"How did you think this was going to work out?" Bruce asks. "How did you ever make yourself believe this could work?"

"You know, they call it feelings for a reason. There's not that much thinking involved."

The Joker looks as weary and exhausted as he feels. It's his fault. Yeah, the to and fro that's wearing down both of them. The Joker's never been anything but consistent.  
But Bruce can't find that consistency for himself. Cause what he knows to be right and what feels right doesn't seem to fit, no matter how he spins it.

He guesses he's one of the weak people the Joker talked about. Because he can't face the truth. The truth, whether with a painted face or not.

*

"This is not over." The Joker says, walking into Bruce's room. "So we fought, whatever."

Bruce lets out a huff. Truth be told, he's glad the Joker– Jack, came here. That at least one of them has the guts.

 

Later the Joker is lying with his head in Bruce's lap. Bruce idly trails his hand through the blond curls, as he zaps through the TV programm. 

*

And then things go wrong. They just go wrong.

 

"Now's not the time for fear." Bane says, hauling the Joker off by his hair. "That comes later."

Bruce watches as the Joker is dragged off. Helplessly.

He's still lying there, half buried under the turned over Tumbler, when Blake and Gordon find him. 

It's not them he asks for help though.

-

Bane stops his punches for a moment, regarding his prisoner. The ever needling thorn in his side, strung up in front of him, bleeding.

"Is it already later?" The Joker asks, mildly petulant.

-

"Get your pathetic ass in gear!" Harley orders him angrily. "We have to save him."

"What the hell do you think I'm doing, you bitch?!"

Neither of them is able to contain the mutual, ever-simmering antipathy anylonger, not with the Joker as their buffer gone.

-

"Let me propose a game. You make me beg and I tell you everything you want to know."

Bane hits him again.

"Please, sir." the Joker sing-songs in a little-boy voice. "Can I have another one?" The Joker waits a moment. "You need to say now: What?! Oliver asked for another one?"

The next punch makes the Joker's head snap back.

"Come on, you can do this better." The Joker taunts through bloody teeth. "Hit me harder."

-

The drive through town, through all the possible hideouts of Bane, is one of the tersest and most uncomfortable moments Bruce remembers in his life. He doesn't think the Joker is dead or even in serious danger, even though there's every logical reason to believe that. Maybe it's the fact that he's never seen the Joker weak. That Jack's never needed his help. But the fact that he hasn't returned on his own by now tells them both that something is clearly not right.

They don't like each other, him and Harley. Neither feeling secure of the Joker around the other. Both having good reason for it. And maybe, maybe, Harley reminds him a little too acutely of what road he's going down.

"Why the fuck would you throw away your entire career, your life?" Bruce asks all of a sudden, into the deafening silence of the car. No party tunes playing this time, the absence of the only person tying them to each other palpable. Though, even absent he still ties them together.

"I »have« a life, sweety." she replies patronizingly. "And there are certainly things more important in life than the degrees we hang up on our walls so we can show the world how far we've come, even though no one cares."

"I guess he got you good."

"I don't think you're in any position to talk."

He watches her as she drives. He doesn't understand the woman. He looks into her face, heavily painted with makeup. The painted likeness of a harlequin looming at him where he can still see the traces of the doctor he's only seen on photos. The white lab coat and tightly bunned brown hair, professional poise and searching eyes exchanged for red, overknee laquer boots, pigtails and a catsuit out of some glittering material with cutoff pantlegs that shows off her legs until they meet the boots. He knows the look in her eyes, even if it's only a shallow copy of the real thing.  
She seemed so sensible on the photos, so sure of herself. What could have touched her to her core like that? It would be too easy to say that maybe she was just mentally disturbed herself all along.  
He read the protocols from their sessions, but there was nothing there that would have explained any of it. Except a small harlequin drawn at the bottom of one of her protocols in the hand of the Joker, which he first saw on the little bat drawn in the man's flat, which he by now knows from countless doodles the Joker does all day. Sometimes on a milk carton, sometimes for Melinda. Once with a permanent marker onto the front window of the tumbler. A small, smiling harlequin couldn't have done this. A small, smiling harlequin, who waved as if to say 'You can do it'.

"I just don't understand it. What the fuck happened in California?"

"When I met Jack, he wanted to change. For you." There's accusation in those two words. "I wanted to help him. I was so sure I could." She smiles, not wistfully but like you do at a good memory. "And then it was me I wanted to change. And I haven't regretted it for just one day." She brushes one hand through her brilliant red hair. "He doesn't have to change. He's perfect exactly the way he is. And I think, you're starting to realise that too."

"We can't just all throw away everything we are, for someone else, Dr. Quinzel." Bruce replies with a tight smile.

"But that's exactly what you're asking of him."

-

The Joker coughs up some blood and bile, spitting it on the floor. He looks at his hand that hangs limply from the cuff. A pensive look passes his face, then the perpetual bloody smirk is back in place. Truth be told, he is hurting by now. Really hurting.

He turns his attention back to Bane.

"Already done? Do you need a break? I know I'm not done. Oh, come on, daddy," the Joker coos. "Pretty please?"

-

Together they fight their way through rows of Bane's goons. At least now they think they've found the right place. Harley can hold her own beside him. No doubt about that. There's no smile on her face today, though, as she smashes in faces around her. She's as tense as he is. She's worried and angry. In part at him too, at the Joker as well. He has the feeling she'd like to smash that baseball bat in his face too and only barely holds herself back. She's more worried than Bruce is, for the simple reason that she knows the Joker better than Bruce does, that she knows something he doesn't. And Bruce feels jealous of whatever that knowledge is.

Bane is there when they arrive.

"Ah, the Batman. You've come just in time to watch your friend die." He pulls out a knife as both Harley and Bruce are still too far away.

That's when Bane's mask is pulled off, with a hand that looks like several fingers are broken.

While Bane retreats the others rush up to the Joker.

The Joker smiles up at him, through black and blue eyes, "You came."

The next thing Bruce knows, the Joker collapses. And that is the scariest thing Bruce has ever experienced.

*

The Joker opens one eye, watching Bruce fondly as he rubs antiseptic onto one of the his wounds.

"Hey, baby." Bruce says, matching the Joker's look.

"We're back home?" the Joker asks mumbled.

"Yes. Yes, we are." He runs a hand through the Joker's hair, repetitively, soothing, for himself most of all.

"I love you," the Joker says, a both solemn and happy expression on his face.

"I know," Bruce replies, thinking again of the truth.

Jack just nods once, then pulls Bruce down to him.

"You wouldn't let anything happen to me." It's not a question. It's a statement. It's the truth.

"No."

The Joker rests his head on Bruce's chest, shoving and tucking him into place as if he were a cushion. Then he falls asleep.

*

It's weird, unexpected, to see the Joker like this. He can barely get up the next morning, limps his way to the toilet. The discoloration in his face and all over his body in full bloom.

He's recuperating slowly. Which tells Bruce how badly he really is hurt. He's silent too. Every step taking all his energy.   
Bruce somehow expected him to bounce back and be on the street again already. But he isn't and so both Bruce and Harley stay in too. She doesn't leave. Sleeps in the guestroom, while Bruce stays with the Joker, in unspoken agreement. She knows Melinda too. Which tells Bruce what he already knew, that Harley's been a regular resident at the Joker's place. Before Bruce came along.

With all that pain and exhaustion, his game face gone, Bruce thinks he's maybe getting a glimpse of the real Jack for the first time. The Jack who's human. The Jack who can get hurt. Who's too tired for appearances. Or maybe it's not the pain. Maybe it's trust. Maybe Jack trusts him enough to let him see him like this. He knows Harley has many times before.   
Maybe the fact that Jack lets Bruce tend to him like this means he's starting to believe that Bruce won't just run away. Maybe because Bruce has finally realised himself that he won't.

*

When they move out again, the Joker is back to his usual self. The smudges of fading bruises still marking his face but taking none of his momentum.

 

"Gotham will fall, Batman. Stop fighting us. You can not keep it up forever." Bane urges.

"That's what she said." the Joker supplies helpfully.

"Gotham will fall! And then I will break you, Batman. You and your weird friend."

Bruce isn't sure if he imagines it, but Bane starts to sound a little desperate.

*

It's suppossed to be some sort of patrolling. There was a real purpose behind this, Bruce is sure about that.

"You might not want to do that, Selina." the Joker warns, world-wisened. "It's cute now. And we all know a little crazy is always a plus, but you get older. And one day, boom! You might end up a cat-lady. You know, weird, alone, no family to visit you, just the corpses of handsome young men in your cellar, which you killed to keep you company."

"Thanks, Joker." Selina puts a hand on her heart. "I'll take that to heart. I guess any advice I could give you, comes too late. About two decades too late."

"Feisty kitty." The Joker makes a sound of approval. "But I'll still take that ass home tonight." He mentions to Bruce. "As I said, a little crazy is always a plus."

"Figures." Selina nods, serenely. "Looking at the Tumbler and Bruce's voluntary efforts for more street safety, it becomes quite clear that he never had a real concept of 'a little'."

*

He watches the Joker sleep. How he can sleep that unpeturbed, at his side... He trusts him. And in a way, Bruce has always known that. Even back then, when he threw him off that roof, the Joker always knew, he wasn't going to let him die.

*

"Tell me about Harley."

"Whatcha want to know? I guess you've read her file. Want me to give you a run-down on her family history? She's my partner in crime, occasional lover, best friend, soulmate. Sounds cliched, I know. True though. Her favorite color is red. She loves to drive Lamborghinis. She's allergic to nuts. Which is kinda ironic given where she used to work. And she gives incredible head. Better than me."

"It's hard to believe that." Bruce chuckled. "How would you know?"

"Huh." The Joker pauses. "True. Also, thanks. I guess we could let you be the judge of that, but that would just be really weird and uncomfortable for all parties involved."

"Yeah, I think I can live without head from your ex-girlfriend."

"You say that now."

"You're saying you can't live without it?"

"Bruce, the only things I can't live without are oxygen, food and water. But there are a few things I choose to live without, for the right kind of benefit."

"What benefit would that be."

"Head from you, for example."

Bruce laughs.

"I'm a romantic guy," The Joker shrugs. "I believe in monogamy when it comes to you. Mostly because I would kill anyone you would sleep with, so I think the same should go for me. Also, because I have really no urge to fuck anyone else when I'm around you."

Bruce smiles. "Come here."

*

He likes him. It feels like he's betraying Rachel but what can he do? He feels like a jerk. An insane jerk. Because how can the company of that lunatic killer feel so good? How can he sit here, the other man half in his lap and he cards his fingers through his hair, presses his lips to the pulse on his throat as the other curls into him like a cat?  
He wants to be there for him, in this crazy, fucked-up world. Wants to be with him. Because they make each other happy. He can see it in the other's eyes. Sees it in that shy little smile that sometimes steals on his face when he looks at Bruce, like he can't believe he's here and like he doesn't dare to smile too big in case he doesn't smile back.  
And they fit together better than he and Rachel ever did. Despite their differences being so much more profound than theirs ever were.  
And it makes sense when you look at all that was. And Bruce wonders what would have happened if he'd stayed that first night. Or in the night he can't remember. If the Joker had never come into existence. And maybe Batman neither.

Bruce let's his hand run over the Joker's back, skin palpable through the thin cotton. Kisses the Joker's ear, mouth wandering over his cheek, over his scars.

"What happened, baby?" he urges softly, tenderly. "Tell me what happened."

The Joker sighs, shaking his head, a hand raking through his hair.

"It wasn't pretty and it wasn't meaningful, or poetic, or any other kind of bullshit that you and everyone else got spinning up in their heads. I got on the wrong side of the wrong guy. And he did this." The Joker indicates his face with a sharp grin. "I fucking bawled my eyes out. Thought I'd have to throw up it hurt so bad. And a really fucking disgusting wound, with your whole mouth flapping open. Was a bitch to eat while it was healing. I was cocky seventeen then and thought I was the shit because of a bit of arson and the whole diagnosed insane part. The people at the looney bin were damnwell pissed. That time I even came back on my own. Covered the whole thing up, that's why it's not in my file. Bad enough that I constantly got away, no, that I'd gotten hurt like that in their supposed care that would have been some hella bad press, for all the highly decorated and well respected doctors. I was shit scared after that. Just sat in my room. Didn't go out anylonger. But then one day I looked in the mirror –They hadn't even taken out the stitches yet– And I thought it's his fucking fault that he didn't kill me. And what kind of a whining fucking bitch am I to sit there and be scared of him. Bad things have only the meaning we attribute to them. What's he going to do to me except hurt me more or kill me? Hurt passes and death is just an end. As long as I'm aware that that's the only power he has over me, there's no reason for fear. And I went out. And I killed him. And every single one of the guys who were with him that night. And I asked him what the hell he'd been thinking was going to happen. What the hell he'd expected. Not that, I guess."

"You were just a kid." Bruce says horrified.

"Let's not get teary-eyed on this, Batsy. Bad things happen to people all over the world. I was maybe not asking for it, but I was damn-sure not keeping my mouth shut either."

"Baby..."

"And as I said, it didn't make me who I am. That was a long fucked-up list of bullshit throughout the years. Or maybe I was born me and had just to develop. But that's really a philosophical question. But now you know the big fucking tale. I hope you're happy. And no, that was not some passive-aggressive dig for you to tell me how sorry you are for me."

"I am terribly sorry, no matter what."

"Jesus Christ! Bruce, bad things happen to good people. In this case, bad things happened to bad people. Get over it."

"I love you."

The Joker launches himself at Bruce in that moment. The kiss aggressive and desperate, latching his mouth onto Bruce's, hands digging, almost clawing into Bruce's shoulders. Only to shove him away the next moment.

"You didn't just say that because you're sorry for me, did you?"

Bruce furrows his brows, then takes hold of the Joker by both shoulders. "No, Jack, I did not."

 

It is maybe an hour later, when Bruce suddenly raises his head out of the pillows.

"Does Harley know that story?"

The Joker looks at him exasperated. "Of course she knows."

*

"Oh my God, you love him, don't you?" Selina stares at him with something like outraged consternation and genuine surprise. "You really do."

"Yeah, I guess I do." Bruce agrees.

"He's not going to change. Trust me, Bruce, I know him a lot longer than you do."

"Oh, you'd be surprised."

"This is what he does." She points at the mangled city behind them. "This is only working in a state of anarchy, like we have right now. He doesn't have to bend to rules now. He can break the law without bothering. Once the city is secured again, he will go back to destroying it. Like he always does. And you will have to lock him up again. Like you always do."

"Maybe."

"Not maybe." Selina shakes her head, violently. "Certainly. Without a doubt. Irrefutably." She looks at him with fond pity. "We are what we are, baby. Harley accepts him like it. Can you?"

I don't think so.

He refuses to answer, though.

*

It goes fast then, at one point. Somehow Bruce suspects that the Joker hasn't really been trying before. What's made him stop playing around though...?  
Maybe he too wants to know what will happen once this is over. Just like Bruce does.

*

The Joker snaps Miranda Tates neck, taking the detonator from her.

"I guess I'm the anonymous citizen now."

Bruce looks at the detonator, then back at the Joker's face. "Don't even think about it."

"You're no fun."

Bane pulls a last rabbit from the hat though, as they find out when he's already in cuffs. 

 

The Joker brushes off the debris, shakes himself and gets back on his feet, inmidst of the end-products of the explosion. "That wasn't me though." he murmurs mostly to himself, over his own ringing ears. He throws a concerned glance at his bare foot.

"Hey, Cinderella! Looking for that one?" Batman comes walking towards him, through the hazes of smoke, dangling the shoe the Joker lost during the explosion, in one hand.

"Well, I'll be fucked," The Joker puts his hands on his hips. "If it isn't my dark knight in shining armor."

"You might just be, Joker." Batman chuckles as he passes the shoe back to it's rightful owner. "You might just be."

*

They get home that night, in still relative peace, for another adreneline-fuelled, deep-to-the-bone fuck, just before the electricity comes back on in the whole city. That's the beginning of the end. The city is back on track. 

The next morning Bruce packs up his stuff and moves back into the manor, stealing himself away like a thief in the night. He needs to breath and think. They both do. It feels like he can't stay anylonger now. The world is back and Bruce Wayne needs to be too, back at Wayne Manor, even though Batman wants to stay with the Joker. Let's not kid ourselves, Bruce Wayne also wants that.

That quick it's over. The cops are freed. The military rides in like they did anything. Then it's business as usual.

*

"What are we going to do about the Joker?" Gordon asks him.

"What do you mean?"

"He's still at large."

"He's not at large, James. He saved this fucking city. Without him we wouldn't even be here anylonger."

"Bruce. We both know he hasn't done that for the greater good but for himself."

"Maybe so. But he's not as bad as you think. I'd thought you'd have learned that by now."

"I know that he will kill again."

"I will stop him. And when it comes to that I will lock him up again."

"I know you've come to... care for him. And it's not his past deeds that worry me. It's what he will do."

Bruce worries too. About just that.

Then Gordon speaks again, "You know the father of that girl is filing charges for abduction, right?"

*

Bruce corners him in a dark alley.

"You ungrateful bastard. He saved your daughter's life! He saved you! He saved this fucking city!" Each sentence is accompanied by a punch.

Bruce steps away from the fallen, bleeding man. "Fuck. Fuck! Jack, what are you making me do?"

*

When they see each other again, it's because Bruce is dropping in at the Joker's place, without warning or invitation. It's quiet there, now with Melinda gone. But at least Harleen doesn't seem to be around, which somehow soothes Bruce. The Joker doesn't act surprised to see him, or pissed off because of how he left. He opens the door with a half-smirk and doesn't wait for Bruce to get in but just turns around and goes back to the kitchen, expecting Bruce to follow him.

"There's a trial running," the Joker tells him amused.

"That's not a laughing matter."

"I'm not scared of Arkham. Or the DA. Certainly not the cops. Why would I? I don't care how the trial turns out."

*

Bruce is back at Wayne Manor. And he wonders what the fuck he's doing.

*

"Is this the moment when the SWAT-team storms in and drags me off to Arkham in chains?" the Joker asks curiously.

"No," Bruce shakes his head. "This is the moment when I come after you."

"Are you now, Mr. Wayne?" He cocks his head.

"You seemed to think I was worth it for quite some time. I think you're worth it too."

"Oh."

*

It's almost domestic. It works. Bruce is staying mostly at the Joker's appartment, again. Sometimes leaving in the middle of the night to go and fight crime.

The Joker keeps his feet surprisingly still. The whole time. Bruce isn't sure exactly what he's doing. But he's not committing crimes.

But the peace can only hold so long.

*

"You know," Jack says. "I don't think I love you enough to want to be sane for you." He adds then in a hesitant voice, "And I don't think you love me enough if you want me to." No make-up. No hair-dye. Just blond curls and a beautiful, scarred face with something like honesty.

"I like you. I like you a lot. I don't need you sane. But, I can't be with someone who kills innocent people."

"Oh, come on! I haven't killed 'innocent people' for almost three years. You can't really be mad about the odd mobster here and there."

"Only because you were locked up for the most of those three years and had an all-you-can-kill buffet of criminals after that."

"So, what? Humor me a bit here!"

"I already am."

"Then I guess it isn't enough." The Joker gives a shrug with a sad smile. "I know the chance for us being together has been long gone. I know the way I am now is nothing you could ever want. And I don't even know if I could change, even if I wanted to. You'll always want me and you'll never keep me. While I can love you without giving a damn what you do, you could never want me without hating yourself for it. I knew that seven years ago. Didn't stop me either. Not for long."

"It could." Bruce blurts out then, coming out of a stupor. "I want it to."

The Joker– no, Jack shakes his head again. "No, you don't. You never wanted me." He says. "You could have had me all this time, but you never wanted me."

"I did. You said it yourself. Every single time. I do now. I don't think at this point there's any use to either of us denying this. I don't know how this will turn out, but I know that it won't just go away. And I don't want this to end with you being back in Arkham and me being back at being alone and miserable. But that's not my responsibilty alone. You have to work for this too. You can't just burn the world down. And I... I guess, I have to accept some things."

*

"I think I have a job for you, Jack. There's this new team they're assembling. Consisting solely of former criminals. It's like a special operations squad."

"I don't need a job, Bruce." Jack says, exasperated. "I have a job. I kill for hire. And occasionally I steal drugs and/or money."

"You could do the same there. You'd be operating near a very fine line between the legal and, well, everything else. And no one would arrest you, should they catch you."

"The only one who ever caught me was you." Jack rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, and I wouldn't have to hunt you."

"You like hunting me. I like you hunting me."

"Maybe it would be nice..."

"You really, really want me to try this, don't you?"

"Do this for me and I will be devoted to you."

"Did you just quote '50 shades of Grey'?"

Bruce only nods, curtly.

Jack chews on his lip for a moment, before he sighs. "Alright, introduce me to that little suicide squad of yours."

THE END

***

All the liars are calling me one  
Nobody's heard from me for months  
I'm doing better than I ever was

All the drama queens taking swings  
All the jokers dressin' up as kings  
They fade to nothing when I look at him  
And I know I make the same mistakes every time  
Bridges burn, I never learn, at least I did one thing right

I want to wear his initials  
On a chain round my neck, chain round my neck  
Not because he owns me  
But 'cause he really knows me

(Taylor Swift - Call it what you want)

**Author's Note:**

> That moment when you've written on a story for so long, you feel like crying when you finally post it.
> 
> Chapter titles:  
> 1: Taylor Swift - Love Story  
> 2: Sia - Fire meet Gasoline  
> 3: Timbaland ft. Katy Pery - If we ever meet again  
> 4: Slight change of Selena Gomez' Good for you  
> 5: Troye Sivan - Bite  
> +1: Ellie Goulding - Something in the way you move
> 
> This started when I was clubbing with my sister and had the sudden inspiration that I wanted a story where the Joker and Batman had met again and again over the years without Batman being aware of it and it just fused with my other idea of a third movie where the Joker is still around and saves Bruce from Bane.


End file.
